Social Media Update the independent integrated agency
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Contents A An introduction from Debbie Hindle, managing director of Four bgb
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B Ten social media and digital marketing trends for 2013
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1 Get Visual - The image powered social web appears unstoppable
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2 The rise of video - three key trends
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3 E-commerce: socialising the purchase experience for ROI
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4 Big data: doing it right
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5 Augmented reality: bringing social to life
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6 Go mobile! Access and the importance of mobile and 4G
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7 Socialising real-life events
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8 Personalising the social experience
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9 Finance: Social media’s impact on company investment
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10 Integration, integration, integration: the demise of the marketing silo
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C Social media platforms: ones to watch for 2013
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1 Vine
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2 Pheed
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3 Thumb
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4 Medium
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5 Chirpify
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6 Chirp
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D Social media channels: a review of 2012 and a look forward
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1 Facebook
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2 Twitter
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3 Pinterest
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4 Google+
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5 Instagram
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6 YouTube
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7 LinkedIn
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8 Blogs
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E Social media usage by market: The rise of ‘The Big Five’
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F Emerging markets: a review of social media usage and opportunities in 2013
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Introduction As I write this, someone, somewhere in the world is already creating the next new disruptive technology for social media. This is the third annual Four bgb social media report, and every year I look back and then forward in awe at how breathtakingly fast things are moving. Just take a look at the volume of social media usage - Google Plus emerged from beta in September 2011 and quickly reached a database of 43 million. By the end of 2012 its database had soared to nearly 400 million with 650,000 new users every day. Facebook meanwhile is winning the global battle against local social platforms and is now the dominant leader in 127 out of 137 countries, with one billion active users. Then consider how fast new platforms are being adopted and embraced by a socially-savvy world. Pinterest was the new kid on the block in June 2011 and Instagram the darling of 2012. In one six month period last year Instagram’s average daily mobile visitor number jumped from 886,000 to 7.3 million – a meteoric 724% leap which is set to continue in 2013. Exciting new platforms to watch out for in 2013 include Twitter’s video sharing option Vines, pay-as-you-go platform Pheed and many more we’ve probably not yet heard of but are about to unleash themselves on our world. And finally consider how consumer expectations are changing equally fast in this heady mix and how they expect brands to engage socially, appropriately and creatively in order to give them their valuable time and interest. So what does this mean for the travel industry in 2013? More change. More exciting opportunities. More new disruptive and creative communication options ahead. This report is designed to provide a concise snapshot of trends and predictions that could have a direct impact on the way the travel industry communicates. We really hope you find it useful. Debbie Hindle Managing director - Four bgb
Tel: 0870 626 9000 Email: debbie.hindle@fourbgb.com Our website www.fourbgb.com Our blog www.fourcommunications.com/blog/practice/travel-blog Our international travel PR and marketing network www.thepangaeanetwork.com It might not be Friday when you read this but please do ff us any way: @debbie_hindle, @fourbgb, @fourcomms, @fourdigital, @fourcolmangetty Four bgb is the travel practice of Four Communications - a fully integrated award-winning agency with offices in London, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Oman and more than two decades of travel expertise. We offer travel specialist representation, sales and marketing services, public relations, social media, search engine optimisation, media buying services and public affairs. Our specialist practice areas include consumer, property, corporate communications, arts, sports, culture and campaigning.
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Ten social media and online trends for 2013 1 Get Visual - the image powered social web appears unstoppable 2013 is set to be the year of image sharing. With an estimated 2.5 billion camera phones said to be in use across the world, we now live in an age in which there is effectively a camera in everyone’s pocket, immediately accessible and connected to the wider world; an era focused on live image capture and image-led content creation. To highlight the real extent of this rise, it is now estimated that 10% of photos ever taken by humankind took place in the last 12 months. Images are becoming the universal language through which we convey our actions and emotions to the world and so it is no surprise that 2012 saw the meteoric rise of social media channels dedicated to interactive photo sharing – Instagram and Pinterest and the development of Vines. In 2013, it seems this trend will only gain further momentum.
Six reasons why images will be central to social marketing in 2013: 1 Articles with images get 94% more total views 2 Including a photo and a video in a press release increases views by over 45% 3 60% of consumers are more likely to consider or contact a business when an image shows up in local search results 4 On e-commerce sites, 67% of consumers say the quality of a product image is “very important” in selecting and purchasing a product 5 In an online store, customers think that the quality of a product’s image is more important than product-specific information (63%), a long description (54%) and ratings and reviews (53%) 6 Facebook updates with images achieve 37% more engagement than text only posts Source: PR Newswire
2 The rise of video – three key trends Video is now the fastest-growing online digital content sector. Thanks to camera phones and social sharing, video is now seen as an accessible social experience to be shared and discussed as well as commercially produced video options. In 2013 it looks as though brands will not only be looking at how they create and distribute video, but how they engage their audiences with the medium to best effect. Our three key video trends for 2013 are:
BoilerRoomTV, which is essentially a music event streaming site, provides an interesting example: “Shot on just a ‘little Logitech webcam’, it is pure voyeurism and allows clubbers to have an uninterrupted view of their favourite DJs without the hollering, drunken moshers and cloudy sound you can get at club nights. And if you miss it, you can just download the podcast and catch up later”
1 Streaming In 2012, Netflix’s video streaming service hit a milestone, surpassing one billion hours of streaming and acting as a real turning point for the way consumers look to consume video. However it’s not just mainstream broadcasting that consumers now expect to access online, they expect live events too on both a big and small scale. 2012 saw an impressive rise in brands ‘live streaming’ events to their followers, something which is only set to continue in 2013. Live streaming video is a simple but powerful tool for any business to allow communities across the world to connect more effectively, interacting in the most realistic way possible online and becoming the conduit for engaging information and discussion. Events can be live streamed for free using Google+ and YouTube or can easily be configured into social media platforms with a simple Facebook app.
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Despite the DIY set-up, Boiler Room has quickly become an internet phenomenon with over 25 million people tuning in every month from venues across the world and taking part in social discussions being carried out on twitter around the event hash tag. It is only a matter of time before more social streaming sites are set up or brands take charge and harness the power of their own events. Event streaming: Best practice example A brand never known to shy away from big, bold marketing strategies is Red Bull, which took live video streaming to the edge of the Earth last year (literally!) sponsoring Felix Baumgartner’s attempt at breaking the sound barrier as he jumped from a specially made capsule 24 miles above Earth. The live stream of the event beat the YouTube record with eight million people watching live as Felix hurtled back to Earth. It may have cost a fortune for Red Bull to get the project going but the amount generated in equivalent advertising space was estimated to be in the hundreds of millions and thanks to social media the brand stunt is still being discussed months on.
David Haigh, chief executive at Brand Finance, said he would be “surprised” if Red Bull, which has positioned itself as a young, thrill seeking organisation, that creates extremely dangerous events, was not worth at least £5bn by 2013.
also shopping and looking up relevant program and product information. So in terms of commercial opportunities, this social integration with broadcast viewers means that TV advertising and social media campaigns are likely to be the unexpected new pairing for 2013.
2 The power of video advertising In 2013, social advertising is making a firm move away from banner ads and embracing interactive content with highly personalised, engaging, timely communications. The high performance of online video advertising has been predicted for some time and recent Google data shows that video is quickly emerging as a favourite format. The Google Media Barometer analysed over 140bn ad impressions across Europe and found that the time spent by consumers watching online video ads had rocketed – with an increase of 56% between Q2 and Q3 of 2012. With more websites being optimised for mobile and the increasing consumer thirst for interactive content, this number is only set to climb.
Considering that an average of 43 minutes are spent each day watching TV, and that many of those viewers are then sharing their experiences online, marketers should find ways to align any TV advertising with their online strategies Sources: Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) Nielson Social Media Report 2012 HubSpot
3 The multi screen experience - social TV In addition to the rise in live video streaming and online video ads, television broadcasting is also ‘going social’. 2012 saw programme hash tags promoted on screen and viewer tweets fed back live on air. In 2012 it was reported that 51% of tablet users and 35% of mobile users, use their device to go online whilst watching television and a further 44% reach for their mobiles to research after seeing a television advert – twice as many than would follow up in store. Consequently, socialising TV has never been more crucial. Across all social media channels, Twitter has emerged as the most powerful driver of ‘social TV’ interaction. In June 2012, a third of active Twitter users tweeted about TV-related content, which was up from 26% at the beginning of the year. What’s more, it’s not a teenage past time as some might perceive - those aged 35-44 are the most likely to discuss television programming with their social connections according to a 2012 Nielson report. This trend is also particularly prevalent in the Middle East and Africa, with 63% using social media while watching TV, and 52% in Latin America doing the same. People aren’t just chatting whilst engaged in social TV, they’re
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3 Social-commerce: socialising the purchase experience for ROI As social media sharing has become increasingly intertwined with consumers’ lives, it is perhaps inevitable that social commerce has become a significant driver for brands in 2012 and will continue in 2013. It has become clear that social media channels have become increasingly important to consumers before making purchase decisions, with over 65% of consumers admitting to checking online before they buy and another 38% of people using their smart phones to research products whilst in store.
However, with almost three quarters of tablet users using their device to make a purchase every week it is becoming imperative that brands also look to socialise the purchase experience to increase e-commerce and see improved ROI for social media campaigns. On average, tablet owners are spending 4.4 hours a week browsing retail sites on their tablet, and so, to effectively deliver on ROI in 2013, brands must look closely at their social offering to deliver on sales. When it comes to travel, social commerce becomes even more important as people continue to be passionate about sharing their travel experiences with friends long after the point of purchase, and those trusted referrals become increasingly powerful. A 2012 Google survey found that 40% of travellers said social network comments influenced their travel planning, while 50% actually based their travel plans on other people’s reviews and experiences. For the travel industry, it seems that the customer experience can be socialised at every level, from inspiration, to research, comparison, decision-making, travel and ongoing recommendation; each with huge value. However without socialising the purchase experience via social media platforms, brands could be losing out on revenue, as well as the opportunity for additional word of mouth growth. Ticketmaster for example, launched an app last year that integrates with Spotify to recommend gigs based on listening history, with the option to then purchase via Facebook. Shortly after Facebook itself stepped forward to say that every time a user posts on their newsfeed that they’ve bought a ticket from Ticketmaster, a friend spends on average an additional $5.30 on a ticket to the same event. Moreover, it seems that every single social touch point between consumer and brand adds value, however those brands offering the option for engaging social commerce are likely to be seeing the highest levels of ROI as they funnel their captive audience to the point of sale before using this action as another point of amplification. Source: Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB)
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4 Big data: Doing it right The increasing importance of social commerce has also resulted in a greater demand for ROI from social media as big data reveals the actual role social networks are playing in buying decisions. Most consumers online, at some point will have told a company their age, location, where they heard about the brand, what they think of its product etc. in a newly emerging interplay between brands and consumers. In this new landscape, a company’s value isn’t based just on what it owns, or how much its stock is worth, but on how much it knows about its customers and how it acts on this knowledge. This shift is made possible by the exceptional amount of data that people now generate in their day-to-day lives. Smart brands are
beginning to understand what this data is worth, and rewarding customers for sharing their information online. Customers however, are not handing over information as freely as they once were and are demanding exclusive services, discounts or greater access in exchange for surrendering their personal data. People are already waking up to how much of their personal data is online and how it is used. Brands that offer transparency and better experiences to customers in exchange for their personal information will thrive in the personal information economy and ultimately have the information to understand not only their customer base but also the ROI of their social media campaigns and social commerce strategies.
5 Augmented reality: bringing social to life Augmented reality applications move one step further than the heralded QR code, bringing objects to life on screen via smart devices to provide related videos, information, maps and images. In 2012 we saw lingerie-clad models step out of their railway station bill boards in London on Valentine’s Day to remind passers by to buy a gift for their loved one, with an option to purchase immediately online. Meanwhile leading print publications jump to life with ‘test driving’ car advertisements and cookery demonstrations to complement culinary features. The biggest issue for travel brands in the advertising arena is the restricted space available to truly convey the physical environment which they are selling. Augmented reality offers the opportunity to present destinations in a real-life experiential way, whether it is with complementary video and imagery that jumps from print features or whether it is improving user
experiences with information and travel tips springing from key destination landmarks. Moving forward, consumers will engage with augmented reality in a much more interactive way and the possibilities for augmented information are endless. The imaginative marketer can already see the enormous potential of this technology and how it could work for marketing brands, providing high impact, direct engagement with consumers. The augmented reality market is set to grow to $5billion by 2015 according to Wikitude, an AR app which already boasts 11 million users worldwide. Trip Advisor was one of their first partners and now offers customers the opportunity to hold their smart device up in their location to view nearby accommodation and restaurant reviews on live geo-location maps A number of augmented reality apps are now on the market with varying costs, but travel brands can get started for as little as a few hours work.
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6 Go mobile! Access; the importance of Mobile and 4G Mobile social media access is up 33% since June 2011 and last year, more people purchased smart phones than PCs. With the average smart phone now available for just £83 this number is likely to grow exponentially in 2013. However, this accessibility has led to significant changes to customer expectations; with 65% of smart phone users expecting websites to be as easy to use as on a desktop What’s more, by the end of 2013, it is estimated that 70% of the UK will have 4g coverage, meaning that, as faster technologies combine with our growing desire for the new and unique, consumers will demand not just access, but immediate access. People will want and expect to use their favourite services 24 hours a day, get speedy updates to e-books and avoid brands that aren’t there 24-7. However, whilst it feels firmly like the word “mobile” has been on every trends list since the dawn of time global marketers haven’t
entirely caught up. According to Forbes, 90% of large businesses have a mobile site, but only 20% include mobile strategies as a fully integrated part of their overall marketing plan. If nothing else on this list comes to fruition, count on “mobile” being a bigger, bolder line item on every major marketer’s strategy this year. Having a mobile strategy shouldn’t, however, be an online afterthought. In 2013 it seems as though mobile planning should come first. It’s not all about the B2C market either; the mobile web is dominating B2B website traffic too. Businesses need to move forward with their customers, as shoppers reach for their mobiles first, changing the path to purchase forever With more than six billion mobile subscribers worldwide, it is clear that desktops haven’t quite had their day – but that mobiles are becoming the computing vehicle of choice. Many commentators have marked 2015 as the year when mobile search and online activity will overtake overall static usage worldwide. For social media the tipping point might arrive sooner than that.
7 Socialising real-life events The desire for quick mobile access has also resulted in a significant rise in brands looking to merge offline events with online social media amplification. In 2012 companies quickly saw the importance of creating a social event within ‘physical events’, appealing to our propensity to share experiences. The London Olympics perhaps provides prime example, with the Games being touted as the first ever told in 140 characters. Live Twitter coverage from The Games meant that more than 35 million people engaged with #TeamGB or #OurGreatestTeam In 2013 it seems that consumers will look to get their biggest buzz by experiencing things as they happen, in real time, accelerating the “play and display” trend to impress friends and colleagues with the news of “what we’re doing as we’re doing it”.
Accessibility case study: Social Networking Mile High Club – Lufthansa Airlines Thanks to Lufthansa Airlines’ branded social media app MySkyStatus, air travellers can update their social networks from the sky. The app allows passengers flying with any airline to automatically post updates about their departure and arrival times, flight locations and even altitudes to their Facebook and Twitter followers while they’re airborne. Top marks, Lufthansa, for keeping people connected in an environment where typically you have to turn off your phone Oh and did we mention, each update also links people back to the Lufthansa MySkyStatus page meaning that customers are effectively promoting the airline to followers for free during their flight? Nice. On a commercial front, this addiction to mobile access means that social media platforms are all quickly scrambling to work out the best way to display mobile adverts. Get ready for plans for Facebook and Twitter mobile ads set to be the first on the scene in 2013.
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8 Personalising the social experience There are almost two billion visits to social networks each day, with 45% of these visitors engaging with brands, something that has seen marketers quickly learn that customer support and sales roles need to be firmly integrated into any social media strategy worth its salt. Increasingly, ‘social’ customer relations have become a new marketing discipline as brands attempt to create communities in social networks. According to a recent Nielson report, 29% of people say they will contact a company with questions or complaints via their Facebook page, whilst this trend will become particularly prevalent on Twitter as brands have quickly started to realise that unless their Twitter presence has realtime components, they won’t be very relevant to consumers for very long. All Twitter recently reported that, 56% of customer tweets to companies are being ignored. Live communication via Twitter is likely to be the emerging trend for brands wanting to go the distance on Twitter in 2013, whether this is via live customer service facilities or live coverage of shows, events and destinations.
In the same way, it is predicted that location based targeting of consumers will also become one of the most important ways to attract new and repeat customers, by personalising their experience down to their specific location. Facebook for example has already started on a plan to offer brands the chance to personalise their timelines based on user IP; meaning that the Facebook timeline a customer sees when they land on a brand page will depend entirely on where they are in the world. This option, which goes beyond the existing option to posts updates to specific audiences, seems to currently only be available to a select group of big name advertising spenders – but watch this space. Source: Nielson social media report 2012
In 2013, we’ll see a much greater investment in social help desks within social networks as brands seek to build trust with consumers on a personal level. When it comes to ROI for these efforts, social consumers are likely to tell an average of 42 people about their positive experiences – even more worthwhile when you consider they are likely to tell 53 people about negative experiences. It appears that when it comes to social media strategies, the customers have spoken and they want personal.
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9 Finance: Social media starts to impact company investment The last bastion to be stormed by digital and social media was always likely to be investor relations, but Brunswick’s latest survey on the use of digital and social media conducted with 500 institutional investors has found that six out of every seven say that digital and social media sources have become more important this year.
In 2013 it appears that online presence and social media strategy will not just impact consumer sales but is also likely to be highly influential when it comes to third party investment.
Investor interaction with digital and social
Impact of online engagement on investor action
52% read blogs (up 5%)
28% investigated an issue they learned about on Twitter (up 17%)
30% use Twitter (up 19%)
24% investigated an issue they learned about on a blog (up 6%)
24% use social networks (up 7%)
12% made an investment decision after reading Twitter (up 8%)
60% of investors look to online sources for company information with just 18% using traditional media Source: 2012 Brunswick Investor Use of Digital and Social Media Survey
10 Integration, integration, integration: the demise of the marketing silo In 2012, the most sophisticated brands realised that social media impacts nearly every discipline, from PR to advertising, digital marketing, customer service, product innovation, government relations, in-store experiences and market research. While many are still testing the waters, sophisticated organizations have started to restructure internal processes and activities around social media and look to remove the marketing silos which, to date, have often hindered the delivery of fully integrated campaigns.
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Brands are quickly discovering that consumers really don’t care whether their concern is PR, advertising, web or search. Brands are now talking to the most marketing savvy generation in history who can spot a marketer from 100 yards (or 91.44 meters as they might consider). Consequently, to deliver meaningful campaigns, brands need to think as one, creating PR campaigns integrated with social media strategies, complemented by PPC and Facebook promoted posts, as well as a few well timed mail outs and the technological savvy to knock up a rip roaring app or two. We are not suggesting that marketers should suddenly be trained in all these areas, but the need to build bridges between often very segmented brand divisions is imperative for success in 2013 and beyond.
Social media platforms: Ones to watch in 2013 1 A review The most talked about new social media application of the year so far, Twitter’s ‘Vine’ is a video sharing app, combining photo and video sharing with sounds. Users can broadcast a six second video (known as a Vine) via a selection of their social networks – including Twitter, Facebook, their blog, Pinterest, Tumblr or via Vine.com.
2 Use VineRoulette to benchmark other brands’ Vines. VineRoulette also streams Vines, however offers users the option to search Vines by tag or theme, meaning that you can quickly evaluate what others in your industry are doing to engage consumers, benchmark them and consider ways to do to it better.
The bitesized videos have eliminated the main hurdle faced by most consumers – producing quality content that can be quickly uploaded. The time restriction of six seconds means that users are finding evermore creative ways to tell their stories. In short, Vine is an easy to use, accessible, Instagram-YouTubeTwitter hybrid that is set to put video sharing firmly on the agenda of social-savvy businesses in 2013. Three top tips for using Vines to achieve ROI in 2013 1 VinePeek: This website, (made by PXi Ventures not Twitter) pulls the latest Vines being uploaded to Twitter and Vine.com and plays them one after the other. Create interesting, engaging Vines and you could drive the growing audience at VinePeek to your social media channels and online platforms as well as encouraging them to share your vines with social sharing buttons.
3 Produce ‘How To’ Vines: A significant number of brands have been quick to adopt Vines, and as ‘how to’ is frequently one of the most widely searched categories online companies are intelligently using Vines to educate their customers and attract impressive search traffic numbers. Though don’t underestimate the creativity required to convey instructions in just six seconds!
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The pay-as-you-go social network that picked up significant interest during the mass Instagram-exodus of late 2012, when users became outraged by their lack of ownership for images.
Buy with one Tweet – Chirpify takes the one click payment option so popular with ecommerce sites like Amazon into the social media domain.
Why share your photos, videos and hilarious observations with the world for free on Facebook and Twitter, when you can sell them? That’s the logic behind Pheed, a new social network launched in October 2012 that gives users (currently mainly celebrities) the option of monetising their “pheeds”. Stars like Miley Cyrus and Paris Hilton are already onboard with media rich feeds of text video and audio mixed with live broadcasts.
Sellers offer products on Twitter, users reply with ‘Buy’ and it is purchased immediately, with no hassle of payment instructions, shopping carts or check outs. The entire transaction is conducted through the buyer’s Twitter account. Apart from buying and selling, Chirpify can also be used for fundraising, giveaways and – most fascinating of all – peer-to-peer payments. Notably Chirpify is free to use but takes a 5% cut anytime you get paid. Despite this it remains an interesting option for brands looking to work on their social commerce in 2013.
3 Personal crowd sourcing – On days you don’t know what to eat or wear, take a photo, upload to Thumb and crowd source the decision. Simple questions typically generate hundreds of thumbs up or thumbs down, plus comments, from the network’s very active user base, sometimes within minutes. Thumb generates serious engagement among users and seems to be set for growth in 2013.
4 The exclusive, invitation-only social network – It could be suggested that social networks have dramatically lowered the bar for sharing information with people, with over 75% of people irritated by their friends ‘over-sharing’. The creator of Twitter brings us ‘Medium’ in an attempt to raise the bar back up on who we share our information with. Medium emphasizes longer form, carefully crafted content from users with something of deeper value to share – much like a carefully curated blog network. While creators are limited to the select few, everyone can read and comment – something that could offer an exceptional opportunity for the luxury travel market, which to date has been slower to find an entry point to social media commerce.
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6 Sharing using sound – For sheer “wow” factor, Chirp may take the prize in 2013 allowing users to instantly share a photo or link with a room full of people. Existing networks like Instagram or Facebook are members-only whilst email requires typing in multiple addressees and Bluetooth has to be paired device by device. Chirp, however permits your phone to emit a high-pitched, two second long, robotic squeak. Other phones within audio range pick up the sound and instantly download the photo or message. Chirps can be shared in a boardroom or a crowded bar, broadcast over loudspeakers to reach huge audiences or even embedded in YouTube videos or TV programs, another exceptional opportunity for brand penetration in a literally crowded marketplace.
Social media channels: A review of 2012 and a look forward to 2013 1 Facebook A review Facebook might be reaching saturation point in North America and Europe, but its big marketing push is paying off in Asia. In fact, the continent is now Facebook’s largest market, with 278 million users, compared to 251 million in Europe and 243 million in North America. This growth appears set to continue, as Mark Zuckerberg focuses on emerging online markets, such as India, Indonesia, and Brazil. India is now the third biggest market for Facebook, with 57 million users, according to analytics firm SocialBakers. But this is still only a small proportion of the population, and they predict that the vast Asian country could be the world’s most populous “Facebook nation” by 2015. The network has recently added support for seven Indian languages, helping drive up growth. The ubiquity of the social network became unquestionable in 2012. 80% of social network users prefer to connect with brands through Facebook; however the issue plaguing most digital marketers is how to actually engage with them. In 2012 Facebook continued to develop opportunities to make money from its captive audience. The introduction of promoted posts was one such development which had marketers salivating over the potential reach of these amplified updates. However, as the shine wears off, brands need to ensure that their posts are genuinely relevant and adding value to Facebook if they want to achieve real ROI and not fuel the already bubbling rebuke from the average Facebook user.
Timeline for brands, otherwise known as Facebook Pages, also debuted offering companies the opportunity to make their profiles far more human and engaging with the option to use more pictures including the “cover”: an 849 by 312 pixel image spanning the top of your profile, which can be changed at any time and is major real estate opportunity for brand awareness. Brands, especially small businesses, may now forgo creating a blog or unique domain page, opting to use Facebook Timeline instead due to the massive number of active Facebook users, the simplicity of setting up a page and the engaging content possible on the new Timeline function. Facebook: An example of best practice Cadbury is no stranger to social media campaigns, but one of its most interesting was to celebrate the brand reaching 1m Facebook fans. The age-old problem of engagement meant that only 16% of all its Facebook fans saw the content it posted, so to test what content users would engage with, Cadbury decided to build a giant Facebook ‘like’ thumb out of pieces of Dairy Milk. It used teaser ads in the build up to the event, and then live streamed in a studio decorated with user-generated content and photos. The team also responded to user requests and comments in the video. As a result, Cadbury gained 40,000 Facebook fans and more than 350,000 people were actively involved in the campaign. Some fans even left the live feed running for hours on end.
Facebook in numbers
Monthly active users now total nearly 850 million
Barack Obama’s victory Facebook post was the most liked photo on Facebook with over 4 million likes
488 million users regularly use Facebook mobile
250 million photos are uploaded to Facebook every day
Facebook has seen a 41% growth in active users from Russia, South Korea, Japan, India and Brazil during 2012
As of 2012, 17 billion location-tagged posts and check-ins were logged
A whopping 77% of B2C companies and 43% of B2B companies acquired customers from Facebook
Sources: Business2Community All Facebook Jeff Bullas
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2 Twitter A review Twitter remains the leading global real-time communications platform, with 400 million monthly visitors to twitter.com and more than 200 million monthly active users around the world. Twitter now notches up a billion tweets every 2.5 days on every conceivable topic. Twitter interaction took a bit of a hit in 2012 when photo-sharing superpower Instagram was bought by Facebook and quickly removed the option for users to ‘tweet’ their images. However it wasn’t long before Twitter launched its own set of photo filters and the Twitter community continues to grow. Pop culture news continued to break on Twitter, like the death of Whitney Houston 27 minutes before the media picked it up. Although its advertising platform started in April of 2010, promoted tweets and accounts in mobile took off this year. Twitter now has over 500 million active users and exceeds Facebook in mobile ad revenue Twitter growth has been particularly strong in emerging markets, with Twitter announcing in January that it has started selling advertising services in the Middle East and North Africa after users in the region tripled over the past year. Before the launch in
the Middle East and North Africa, the product suite was available only in the US, UK, Japan and Latin America. According to the Arab Social Media report, Arabic is the fastest growing language in Twitter history. There were more than 2million active Twitter users in the Arab region at the end of June 2012, who generated 172.5 million tweets in March 2012. Twitter influencers still rein supreme: An example of best practice: Online influence is notoriously hard to measure, yet in 2012 brands continued to look to Twitter influencers to spread the word about their brand. Virgin America offer a great example, partnering with leading Twitter user rank-score ‘Klout’ to offer top “Twitter influencers” free flights. Those with the most influential Klout score (which is based on a number of factors including number of Twitter followers, how often their updates were being re-tweeted, etc) were offered free return flights. Simple, yet straightforward and effective in reaching online consumers, not to mention the media coverage and brand buzz secured.
Twitter in numbers
The network surpassed 500 million users in 2012
It has the highest percentage on mobile with 50% of users accessing Twitter on a mobile device
It became an important player in conversations around the U.S November elections: Barack Obama’s victory tweet was the most re-tweeted tweet ever with over 800,000 re-tweets
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Top three countries on Twitter are now, the USA at 107 million, Brazil 33 million and Japan at nearly 30 million
32% of all internet users are now using Twitter
In 2012, 1 million accounts were added to Twitter everyday
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50% of Twitter users are now using the social network via mobile
In 2012, 175 million tweets sent from Twitter every single day
3 Pinterest A review
Pinterest: best practice example
Pinterest’s rapid growth began late in 2011 and rocketed through 2012. In many months last year it experienced 400% growth month-over-month. The image-led site which encourages user to ‘pin’ their favourite images to themed boards, attracted millions and continues to grow. In late 2012, even The White House joined Pinterest.
BMI, (now part of BA-Iberia) launched a Pinterest competition in 2012 appealing to holidaymakers, asking users to re-pin images from its boards showing where they’d most like to go on holiday, with the winner receiving free flight tickets. BMI also promoted the competition and announced winners via its Tumblr, creating more of a dialogue with users than Pinterest currently allows. Re-pinning competitions have become increasingly common on Pinterest, especially amongst travel brands and have proved to be a great way of sharing products with a new audience while encouraging click-throughs back to your site.
As a marketer, Pinterest means that producing enviable product photography is more important than ever when encouraging users to ‘re-pin’ your photos and transition to your website to purchase. Creative and visually engaging product photography is likely to be the order of the day for marketers worldwide in 2013.
Pinterest in numbers
Who?
97% of the fans of Pinterest’s Facebook page are women while 50% of all Pinterest users have children
28.1% of Pinterest users have an annual household income of $100,000
Although the UK only has 200,000 unique users compared to an estimated 12m in the US, the gender split is 56% male and 44% female
What?
57% of Pinterest users interact with food-related content
Pinterest, it seems, is being utilised for social commerce, less for engagement:
Pinterest referrals spend 70% more money than visitors referred from nonsocial channels
- The average Pinterest user spends 98 minutes per month on the site, compared to 2.5 hours on Tumblr, and 7 hours on Facebook
Pinterest users are more likely to be ‘creators’: adding and sharing retailer/ brand related content
- 83.9% of a ‘pinners’ time is spent pinning, while 15.5% is spent liking and 0% is spent leaving comments
In contrast Facebook users are more likely to be ‘participators’: interacting with promotional activities developed by retailers and brands
- 69% of online consumers who visit Pinterest have found an item they’ve bought or wanted to buy, compared with 40% of Facebook users - Over 80% of ‘pins’ are ‘re-pins’
Source: Bizrate
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4 Google+ A review The launch of Google Plus (Google’s own social networking platform) was met with some cynicism, but Google is integrating this social product with search to such an extent that brands are quickly adopting the platform as one of their lead channels in order to both communicate with consumers but also keep their presence in Google search rankings. Google has been focussing heavily on increasing membership in 2012 hosting frequent celebrity ‘Hangouts’ on Plus with celebrities like Will.I.Am and David Beckham. Additional features added this year include: • Google+ Local: Replaced Google places in May 2012 and now integrates directly with the Google+ service to allow users to post photos and reviews of locations directly to its page on the service. Additionally, Google+ Local and Maps also now feature detailed reviews and ratings from Zagat (a bar and restaurant review functionality), which was acquired by Google in September 2011
• G oogle+ Events: Allows users to add events, invite people, and then share photos and media in real-time from the event. The program is integrated with Google Calendar, and is posed as a direct competitor to similar features offered by Facebook • G oogle+ Communities: Allow users to create ongoing conversations about particular topics. Google+ Communities can also be created and managed under Google+ Page accounts Consequently, the opportunities for destination marketing across Google platforms in 2013 are exponential in terms of both search and social. In terms of number of registered users and active accounts, Google Plus is still some way behind the other big players – but its speed of growth would indicate it won’t be long until it catches up!
Google+ in numbers
625,000 new users on Google+ every day
At least 60% of Google+ users log in daily whilst at least 80% of Google+ users engage on a weekly basis
Who?
48% of fortune global 100 companies are now on Google+
47% of Hispanic consumers use Google+, compared to the US average of 18%
42% of worldwide Google+ users are single; 27% are married
68% of Google+ users are male, while 32% of Google+ users are female
Sources: PR Daily Google P
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the independent integrated agency
Why move to G+?
Google+ pages appear in search results for 30% of brand term searches for brands with G+ pages, up from 5% in February 2012
Google+ users spend on average 12 minutes per day on Google+
Total ‘circlers’ of brand pages on Google+ increased by 138% between February and May 2012
It’s on the rise. A report from Social Media Examiner found that 40% of marketers use Google+, 70% want to learn more about it and 67% plan on increasing Google+ activities
‘Student’ is currently the number one occupation of Google+ users
Google+ is expected to attract 400 million users by the end of 2012, with over 650,000 new users everyday
5 Instagram A review
Instagram: Examples of best practice
Instagram, has been the run away success of the social media platforms in 2012
A recent report by travel technology website Tnooz studied 20 leading airlines on Instagram finding that Air Asia is the most talked about brand with near 15,000 followers, closely followed by South West Airlines with nearly 11,000.
From the addition of three new filters, to the launch of Instagram profiles on the web (Instagram was previously a smart device only app), and the introduction of a new unique way to browse photos, called ‘PhotoMap’ it seems there has been no stopping the image sharing social platform, and so it is little wonder that is was acquired by Facebook in 2012 just two years after its launch. In one six-month span, Instagram’s average daily mobile visitors jumped from 886,000 to 7.3 million, which is a 724% leap, a meteoric rise which is set to continue in 2013.
Bmi Baby was the brand found to be first off the mark, and most creative, interacting with 170 Instagramer groups (collections of like-minded snappers around the world) persuading them to tag their photos with the name of the destination. The user generated photos then made up dedicated albums on the airline’s website. In just a month, over 3,000 photos were submitted to the site, with a public vote launched to let users decide on the best image. The winner received a free pair of flights to Italy.
Instagram in numbers
Over 100 million active users worldwide
Instagram gains one new user every second
40 million photos uploaded every day across the world
The average Instagram user spent 257 minutes accessing the photo-sharing site via mobile device in August, while the average Twitter user over the same period spent 170 minutes viewing
Images achieve 8,500 likes and 1,000 comment per second
300 million of these pictures are then uploaded to Facebook a day (via Instagram)
Instagram had 1 million downloads in a day when the Android app launched
To put this in perspective in terms of influence over the word’s imagery, in 2012 Instagram was sold to Facebook for $1 billion whilst Kodak’s value was estimated at $77 million
The Android version received over 430,000 pre-registrations
Source: Instagram/ New York Times
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6 YouTube
7 LinkedIn
A review
A review
Despite the channel’s spectacular user figures, a significant number of brands still see the video sharing channel as a place solely used to get famous quickly off the back of viral videos – who didn’t love Gangnam Style?
In 2012 LinkedIn focussed on simplifying its offering, creating new user profiles and homepages that make it a place that members want to visit every day. LinkedIn Today was also reimagined to make it more streamlined, accessible and engaging whilst company pages became more focused on news and updates than generic company information. This move was supported by the launch of its first tablet app, proving that the platform really understand how their demographic starts and ends the day.
Although for very clever (and possibly lucky) brands, viral videos can be exceptionally successful, the real long term opportunity for companies in 2013 is to use the rise in social video to their advantage and create videos that add value and engage with communities, be it via informative videos or well-crafted storytelling. Consumers now want to converse with brands using video, and those quick to respond are likely to prove most successful online in 2013 and beyond. YouTube in numbers
Over 800 million unique users visit YouTube each month
70% of YouTube traffic comes from outside the US
Over 4 billion hours of video are watched each month on YouTube
YouTube is localised in 53 countries and across 61 languages
72 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute
In 2011, YouTube had more than 1 trillion views or around 140 views for every person on Earth
7,000 hours of news related video uploaded everyday
39,000 videos uploaded in just one week
Videos uploaded to YouTube tagged Obama or Romney were viewed 2.7 billion times during the 2012 election cycle
YouTube on mobile
25% of global YouTube views come from mobile devices
People watch one billion views a day on YouTube mobile
YouTube is available on 400 million devices
Traffic from mobile devices tripled in 2011
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the independent integrated agency
The professional networking platform has also been quick to move away from its US roots, which was a stumbling block for some companies around the world who were unsure that the US-centric site was home to their demographic. In 2012 LinkedIn proudly announced 63% of members are now outside the U.S. In addition to this, LinkedIn ‘Influencers’ was also added this year; a pick of 170 leading industry professionals to follow and interact with, an initiative that proved both inspirational for users and a great way for LinkedIn to show off some of its power players to potential new members.
LinkedIn in numbers
Over 187 million members across the world
55 million endorsements have now been made
Over 2.6 million business pages
25% of members are using LinkedIn on their mobile
Now available in 19 languages
8 Blogs A research report from Four bgb As the value of social search increases, the impact that bloggers have to generate buzz, links, brand awareness and word of mouth recommendations will increase. We predict that 2013 will see far more companies move beyond treating bloggers like traditional journalists and begin to understand that their content publishing influence goes far beyond the written word, as travel bloggers stake their ground as social media campaigners. In research we undertook amongst more than 70 travel organisations social media amplification is the thing travel marketers most value in working with bloggers (59%) alongside having their brand represented by a neutral independent voice (54%) enhancing SEO and working with niche bloggers such as family or luxury experts (52%). Three quarters of the survey said they had supported bloggers on press trips, a third had commissioned a blogger to write for their website, one fifth had advertised on a blogger platform and less than 10% had looked at sponsored blogs or strategic relationships. Travel bloggers are a valuable way to reach niche and engaged communities, but targeting the right blogger was a problem identified by around half our survey and two thirds also said they were worried about evaluating the results of that work. Opportunities for brands in 2013 Conferences: Travel blogger conferences are springing up globally with hundreds of the world’s most influential bloggers coming together to hone their craft, discuss collaborations and methods of best practice and also explore a destination together. Conferences are open to bloggers and corporate attendees and are a critical way to build blogger community relations.
Opportunities also exist for brands to sponsor various conference events, or provide pre/post conference tours to delegates; again offering an engaging way to integrate with the travel blogging community and establish long term relationships. Key conferences this year include Travel Bloggers Unite (Rotterdam), Traverse (Brighton) and TBEX (Toronto and Dublin) Collaborations: 2012 was possibly the year that travel bloggers realised their worth, or certainly the year they decided to do something about it! As such we have seen a remarkable move towards the formation of professional collaborations of bloggers offering fully fledged social media campaigns to travel brands. Groups of bloggers such as Navigate Media, or i-Ambassador, offer brands the power of a group to amplify campaign messages. The blogging group collaborating on the campaign will host discussions online before, during and after travel, using not only their individual influence but the significant amplification of the group to promote campaign messages across all social media platforms. Drawing on their expertise as social media campaigners, travel bloggers are also making a move into campaign planning with groups producing innovative and engaging project ideas for big brands on a regular basis. To give an idea of potential reach, Cape Town recently commissioned the i-ambassador group on a project called #lovecapetown and reached 1.2 million people with 37million twitter impressions as the message spread across each of the CapeTown ambassadors’ networks. This is certainly something far beyond the remit of a simple blog trip and a key opportunity for brands in 2013 to work with bloggers as social media partners as opposed to just blog post writers.
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Social media usage by market: The rise of “The Big Five” Back in 2009 there were 17 social networks that were the market leaders in at least one country, resulting in a vast differentiation in social media platform usage across markets. Last year it was a much more homogeneous picture according to data collected Alexa. Not only were there just five market leaders in 2012, social media giant Facebook now dominates in all but 10 countries. In the past year, it has overtaken the likes of Mixi in Japan, Zing in Vietnam and other local competitors in markets as diverse as Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Latvia. Facebook with 1 billion active users has established its leadership position in 127 out of 137 countries. One of the drivers of its growth is Asia that with 278 million users surpassed Europe’s 251 million as the largest continent on Facebook. North America has 243 million users, South America 142 million, Africa almost 52 million, and Oceania just 15 million; whilst in the last few months Zuckerberg’s Army conquered Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia and Vietnam. However there are a number of markets where social media platforms outside ‘The Big Five’ remain dominant. In Russian territories there was a long battle between two main local players: V Kontakte and Odnoklassniki. According to Alexa the first is gaining ground and now has 190 million registered users. In China, where Facebook remains officially banned, QZone still dominates the landscape with 552 million users, followed by Tencent Weibo and Sina Weibo. Since the latest update QZone has also conquered South Korea. In Iran, where it’s hard to access Facebook due to state censorship, the leader is Cloob. Sources: Vincos.it Facebook Ads Platform Vincenzo Cosenza Alexa web traffic data
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the independent integrated agency
Top three social networking sites across markets June 2012 Countries
SNS #1
SNS #2
SNS #3
Australia
Austria
Badoo
Belgium
Badoo
Brazil
Orkut
Linked
Canada
Qzone
Tencent Weibo
Sina Weibo
Denmark
Badoo
Finland
France
Badoo
Skyrock
Germany
Wer-kennt-wen
India
Orkut
Italy
Badoo
Japan
Mixi
Netherlands
Hyves
Norway
Portugal
Badoo
Orkut
Sweden
Russia
Odnoklassniki
V Kontakte
Spain
Tuenti
Badoo
United Kingdom
United States
China
Emerging markets: a review of social media usage and opportunities in 2013 Social media usage is set to rise everywhere over the next couple of years but growth will continue to be far higher in emerging markets, as internet accessibility and more sophisticated forms of online engagement continue to catch up with those in more established markets. The two single biggest emerging markets in 2011 and 2012 were India and Indonesia according to eMarketer figures. In 2011 the two countries experienced a massive social network user growth of 51.5% and 51.4% respectively. In 2013 India and Indonesia
are still expected to see the biggest growth, at 37.9% and 28.8% respectively. Compare this to the US and UK markets, which grew by only 9.8% and 9.9% (and are likely to plateau in 2013), and it becomes clear that global brands can no longer continue to focus on European and US markets. The message for online marketers seems to be quite clear, get into the emerging markets quickly, before they reach the brand penetration levels experienced in the West. Source: eMarketer
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geeky At Four, we embrace our inner geek. Our team of digital designers, animators, programmers, developers and social media specialists can help you make sense of the online world. To find out more contact einir.williams@fourcommunications.com or call 0870 626 9000.
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