A recent survey from Razorfish “FEED: Digital Brand Experience Survey”, polled US Internet users who have ever ‘friended’ a brand on Facebook or MySpace- 40.1% said YES while the remaining 59.9% of respondents said NO.

Consumers reported that their primary motivation for following or friending a brand was to get access to exclusive deals and product discounts. As an example, there’s Dell who declares to have gained $3 million since 2007 thanks to its Twitter strategy.

What happens after you ‘friend’ a brand on Facebook or MySpace

According to the study, 96% of respondents either always (22.94%), usually (39.15%) or sometimes (33.9%) recommend the brand to others.

22.69% always consider the brand when in the market for the product or service, while 40.90% of respondents replied they usually consider the brand and 34.41% sometimes considers the brand, for a total of 98%. On the other hand, 21.45% of respondents recognized that engagement raises their awareness of the brand, followed by 38.65% who say it usually raises their awareness and 36.66% who say it sometimes raises their awareness. And finally, a total of 97.01% of respondents declared buying a product or service from the brand.

These findings explain the importance of building and monitoring a brand’s online presence as to be able to fully interact with prospects and customers through the different social media channels. Keeping a healthy, attention-grabbing and impacting online image that engages cosumers actively is critical for the success of any online marketing strategy.

It seems Google is deviating its attention from YouTube and is finding more ways to monetize through its own search site, yet again.

But its seems the search giant is not alone in the development of new strategies to generate online revenue; MySpace and Facebook are also coming up with their very own plans of action.

This time, Google is planning to launch a music search service rumored to be called ‘Google Music’ or ‘One Box’ although no declarations have been made on behalf of the Mountain View-based company.

As explained by the AP, Google Inc. next week will launch music search pages that will package images of musicians and bands, albums, links to news, lyrics, videos and song previews, along with a way to buy songs on one search results page.

Sounds like a potential direct competitor to Apple’s iTunes, doesn’t it?

Song previews and sales on Google will feature links to music sites and retailers like Lala and iLike, which was bought by MySpace this month. Searching for an artist or song will apparently bring up a box with a streaming link assigned to either music players, which will allow for users to remain within the search results page.

The opportunity here lies in that Google can attract music fans (and general traffic) who may be looking for information on artists and songs before they land on any of the top music services and gear them in practically any direction they want.

Year over year, Facebook visits nearly tripled increasing from 19.94% in September 2008 to 58.59% the following year. During the same period, visits to MySpace have reduced by half while Twitter realized a 1170% share of market this year.

In addition, overall U.S. visits to social networking Web sites increased 62% in September 2009 compared to September 2008 among the custom category of 155 of the leading social networking sites.

In terms of minutes, MySpace scored first among the top five most visited social networking sites with 25 minutes and 56 seconds, followed by Tagged and Facebook with 25 minutes and 17 seconds and 23 minutes, respectively. However, Facebook attained the largest increase in average time spent among the top five social media sites with 23%.

Some considerable shift in demographics was also revealed by the study showing that visitors 55+ increased 26% on MySpace and an impressive 108% on Facebook, while the large part of 18-34 year old MySpace and Facebook user group, suffered a decline.

Overall U.S. visits to social networking sites from users 55+ increased 77% from September 2008 to September 2009. In the same time period, visits from users 18 to 24 to social networking sites have decreased 33%, perhaps marketers should take particular note of this recent shift in audiences.

To close, I’d like to leave you with this video on the ‘rise of Facebook’:

About a week ago, Simon Fuller, a journalist from a UK-based online publication brand-e.biz, approached us for information for an article he was writing on luxury brands and their involvement in social media; how to operate across social media, reasons why to get involved and how to go about it.

Our MD, Marco Corsaro highlighted the various reasons why brands should look into integrating a social media strategy into their online marketing initiatives as to not miss out on any valuable opportunities and the importance of providing fresh, new content in order to keep audiences engaged.

Here is an abstract from the article:

High-end sociability. Luxury brands are facing something of a dilemma when it comes to social media. On the one hand, everyone else seems to be at it, and they certainly don’t want to miss out. On the other, they’re all about luxury- and that means maintaining a certain distance from the consumer.

“With regards to luxury consumers, we know that they consider the Internet as one of the primary sources of information about luxury products,” says Marco Corsaro, MD of new media marketing outfit 77Agency. “They spend more time online than using any other media, [we know] that a higher percentage of them than average are Internet shoppers 75% versus 70% – and that they are twice as likely to be involved in consumer-generated content online.

“Having said that, many luxury brands have been slow in taking the lead in managing their presence in social media networks, missing out on important opportunities to engage directly with consumers and brand ambassadors,” he adds.

But it looks like slow-poke brands won’t be able to keep holding back, since consumers chat about them across social networks anyway.

“It’s no longer a question of avoidance,” says Corsaro. “Brands already feature strongly in social media exchanges as consumers use Facebook, Twitter and other networks to express their feelings and exchange opinions about brands and products on a daily basis.”

To read the full article click here.

Is the digital advertising industry picking up as we approach 2010?

According to the Group M, internet advertising will grow by double-digit increases next year. Data shows us that time spent by users on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace increased more than seven-fold…from 1.7 billion total minutes in 2007 to nearly 14 billion minutes in 2008.

Sorrell came to the conclusion that since people are already spending 20% of their time online, companies should also be increasing their online spent to 20%, which would make sense. Instead, companies are spending up to 13%.

However, new predictions say global internet advertising will climb 11% to $64.7 billion…about 15% of all global measured ad spending in 2010, which is up from 13% in 2009. Search advertising and mobile advertising will be leading the pack showing the most increase as traditional media spend will continue to lose share.

Search advertising is predicted to hit a 43% share of all online advertising in 2010, from 38% back in 2006.

On the other hand, global mobile advertising is expected to climb 19% to $3.3 billion in 2010, representing 6% of the global advertising total spend.

So far, we’ve seen internet outperform all sorts of other media and even stealing share from even the most traditional and well-established. The recession has also made room for this to happen, however, the trend continues and digital advertising keeps proving to be an effective strategy for brands to get the most visibility on the web.

A unique aspect about social networks is that they offer the ability to identify and reach the exact  target audience while facilitating interaction between brands and existing or potential customers. But how do you know if your online marketing approaches are maximizing the exposure of your online business?

A comScore report shows some interesting data that could make those advertisers who invest only on creating fan pages think twice about their digital marketing strategy.

One out of every five ads viewed online comes from a social network.  In this case, Facebook and MySpace, the two most popular social networks, accounted for more than 80% of all ad impressions. In further detail, 9.2% of daily impressions were generated via MySpace, while 8.2% came from Facebook.

“Because the top social media sites can deliver high reach and frequency against target segments at a low cost, it appears that some advertisers are eager to use social networking sites as a new advertising delivery vehicle,” Jeff Hackett, comScore’s senior vice president declared.

In terms of advertisers, AT&T had the most ad impressions for the month of July with more than 2 billion impressions, which accounted for 30% of the company’s total number of impressions during that month. Expedian Interactive came in second with nearly 1.3 billion impressions for that category.

In conclusion, display ads running on social networks like Facebook and MySpace are proving to be quite effective, perhaps more effective than just fan pages or applications. There’s clearly a change in trend that cannot go unnoticed. Data show consumers are responding positively to the display ads they encounter while surfing on their favorite social network, thus leading to other positive results.

Social media for some people is just a fad. Many believe it’s a quick, easy way to go about reaching a goal and that’s it. Been there, done that…neeext!

Companies use it to grow business, which is not necessarily something you can achieve overnight. It’s a long-term effort.

Yes, social media has it’s downsides too. For instance, once you’re in it, you’re in it for good. Everyone- followers, customers, friends, subscribers and prospects expect you to do a good job. Social media does not protect brands. Make the wrong move and all you will create is negative buzz out there. We’ve heard both horror and  success stories, but because your customers and employees are talking about you, the least you can do, specially when in doubt, is listen, understand, then engage.

Seems like social media done wrong is worse than not doing it at all. So businesses want to join in and take advantage of the long-lasting benefits it’s got to offer. But first, you need to understand what each social network is about prior to spending your marketing money.

In other words, research. Which of the main networks (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube) do you want to focus on? Should you also consider blogs or forums?

Next step, what is your company trying to achieve?

1. Build online brand presence
2. Generate sales and leads
3. Generate traffic to the website
4. Gauge feedback and use that to better your product or service
5. Generate links to the website
6. Provide customer care and problem solving
7. And the list goes on.

Also, the faces who will be handling these initiaves behind the scenes should follow certain requirements. For instance, they must have a deep and technical understanding of the business products and services. They should be a ‘people person’ and be good at interacting with others as well as providing customer service.

A general understanding of how the different types of social media work is definitely a must. Each type has its own set of rules and serve for different purposes. Not to mention there’s social networks, social communities, social news sites, social sharing sites, etc.

Keep track of your activities. Whether its the number of posts, updates, news feeds, images, videos, comments, new content, reviews, you should keep count in order to be able to review your outcomes and identify whether it’s time to pull the cord or just keep going.

To know about Big Brands using social media, take a look at this post from Mashable.

The latest global consumer survey ran by the company disclosed that many consumers base their buying decisions on the opinions of friends and colleagues. A total of 25,000 Internet users from 50 different countries participated in this survey and from this sum, 90%  declared they trust recommendations and opinions from their personal network of contacts.

Two years ago when the same survey was introduced by Nielsen, only 78% of individuals trusted the opinion of others. Second place for most trusted source is actually split-up between two categories, brand websites and consumer opinions posted online with 70% of trust.

Nielsen comments on this discovery: “Despite the authority of word of mouth when it comes to consumer decision-making, advertisers still have a major say in the process.”

Perhaps this is a sign that marketers should begin shifting their budgets towards the online for this study gives clear evidence that consumers are relying greatly on opinions posted on the Web by people they know directly or friends of friends.

Whichever it is, we can certainly attribute these facts to the exponential growth of social media. It is through platforms such as Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and YouTube that individuals can better appreciate the points of views and opinions of thousands of individuals, that in turn help in their decision-making process.

“The ability to turn this around rests on overhauling the way display advertising is served online so that it becomes a more effective medium for brand advertisers and a more trusted form of advertising in the mind of the consumer.”

What do they all have in common? It all revolves around the Web, but not only that, the online is also outperforming all other media.

Take a look at the graph below. It’s taken from an article by Luca Conti, featured on today’s IlSole24Ore technology supplement, Nova24. It’s a comparison graph between Web 2.0, Email and Video that shows how Web 2.0  surpasses email and video.

We can certainly attribute this growth of the online medium to social networks due to the fact that brands continue to see more opportunity to exploit the digital enviroment as an effort to increase brand visibility and overall revenue.

The big story here is that social networks have opened up a whole new world for brands and marketers. Now, instead of anticipating what consumer’s reactions will be after the launch of a product or new brand design, brands can instead turn to the different social platforms for feedback and valuable opinions.

In like manner, brands are also realizing that they can change the way in which they communicate with the consumer and use these social channels to listen, interact, answer questions and share experiences with their own target markets.

According to Nielsen, Social networking sites eclipsed E-mail in global reach at 68.4% vs. 64.8% in February 2009.And even more significant, in only the first few months of 2009, the reach of these sites is growing at a brisk pace, faster than any other online sector.

Twitter, as we’ve mentioned before, has been and will continue to be the biggest social media story in 2009. However, MySpace and Facebook are not left too far behind as it clearly shows on the following buzz graph.

It’d be interesting to see some corporate social media stories revealing how companies have decided to tap into this whole new world of connectedness and interactivity and how it’s proven to be effective for them.

Even some of the most prominent designers you would have never expected to see using Twitter, Facebook or any other online social media, are making a point that such channels are radically changing the way fashion brands engage with their customers and prospects online.

Brands are coming to realize that people are interested to know beyond what’s hiding behind the fashion label. Oscar de la Renta does a great job in managing his Twitter profile by appointing what he calls the OscarPRGirl, to promote the brand ‘from inside one of the world’s most prestigious design houses’. Who wouldn’t want to know more about what goes on inside Oscar’s fashion empire?

Donna Karan tags right along with her very own PRgirl who provides the latest behind-the-scenes scoop from inside DKNY. And this is what people like to see, a more humanized, responsive and sensitive facet of the brand.

Social media channels offer great exposure for the brands and a great opportunity to reach out to customers, all this while profiting from all the free advertising and virality that comes with it.

“Customers can feel like they are part of the brand’s extended family, and therefore the brand itself, while the interactive element further deepens that relationship,” said Alex Bolen, chief executive officer of Oscar de la Renta. “These characteristics address and satisfy that ‘tribal’ part of the fashion consumer — the way in which people identify themselves by the brands they buy.”

Social media represents a powerful brand advantage that allows for both the brand and the consumer to engage in conversation while offering a fun and easy way to stay tuned on the latest products, lines, and promotions. As reported by Nielsen Media, Facebook and MySpace represent the most established social platforms with a retention rate of almost 70%.

One important fact that should not be overlooked by brands is that social media is here to stay, whether they evolve, lose, gain influence, it needs to be part of a holistic marketing strategy. As we know, the fashion world is constantly shifting and people’s habits are constantly changing too-particularly shopping habits- therefore, brands would need to adapt to these changes and keep up with the consumer and their demands.