http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php Copyright 2012, Marne Semick Marne Semick en-US SPHPBLOG 0.5.1 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry120206-203417
Facebook reaches more than half the world's internet population outside of Asia, and the company itself expects user growth to slow thanks to the law of large numbers. So to fuel the growth expected of it as a public company, it will have to double down on advertising, including two key areas: mobile and local.

Facebook's revenue grew 88% in 2011 to $3.71 billion, according to its IPO filing, but Trip Chowdhry, a senior analyst at Global Equities research, thinks year-over-year growth should be north of 100% for the next five years to justify a $100 billion valuation.

"I would say $50 to $60 billion would be the ideal valuation, considering the future is uncertain," Mr. Chowdhry said.

In terms of new revenue streams, Facebook has an expanding "Payments" business, composing about 15% of 2011 revenue. It takes a cut of transactions made through its virtual currency of "credits," the majority of which come from Zynga. And Facebook is expected to begin delivering ads to its 425 million mobile users this spring, possibly before it goes public, though it will need to exercise restraint so as not to disrupt the user...

For more on this article, please go here.
]]> Social Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry120206-203417 Marne Semick Tue, 07 Feb 2012 01:34:17 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=12&m=02&entry=entry120206-203417 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111229-193919
DECEMBER 26, 2011 · BY ARMANDO ROGGIO

Marketing techniques that worked in the past may be far less successful in this emerging era of mobile devices, personalization, and social media.

What follows are five suggestions for potentially potent marketing tactics for the coming year. These are not wholly new techniques, but rather ones that could grow in importance and effectiveness in 2012.

Text Marketing

Responsys, a marketing software provider, believes that text messaging — called SMS by the more technically inclined — will be an important marketing vehicle in 2012. Specifically, Responsys expects companies to use SMS marketing to uncover shopper preferences.

For example, a business might send a text to its SMS list offering a $5 gift card in exchange for answering a question like "What's your favorite thing to do in the kitchen?" When the SMS subscriber texts back, "bake," marketers will know to send that customer baking-related offers, Responsys explained.

SMS marketing will also be important for "flash" offers that give shoppers deep discounts within a limited time frame. This is especially effective for multi-channel merchants.

Mobile Optimized Merchandising

There are more than 90 million smartphone users and 24 million tablet users in the United States, according to shopping personalization firm RichRelevance. The company, which works with many large online retailers, believes mobile commerce will grow significantly in 2012, continuing its upward climb.

"U.S. online retail dollars attributable to mobile devices has doubled from 1.87 percent in April 2011 to 3.74 percent in December 2011," RichRelevance reported in a published statement.

While many online retailers have already "optimized" their sites for mobile devices, at least some of these mobile offerings lack the on-site merchandising common on full-version websites.

In 2012, smart marketers will work to better integrate up-selling, cross-selling, and similar online merchandising into the smartphone-friendly versions of their sites.

Subscriptions on the Rise

In 2012, online retailers should seek to sell subscription services when and where it makes sense. And these services need not be limited to magazines or the like, but could include just about any product one could imagine.

Consider three online retailers that are using subscription models to sell right now.

Quarterly.co lets shoppers subscribe to receive physical items selected by an influential and tasteful contributor. Specifically, a shopper could pay $25 a quarter to have Mike Monteiro, co-founder of Mule Design, choose an item for them. Likewise for $25 per quarter, a shopper could get an item and several stories written by children from the Brooklyn Superhero Supply Company, which is part of a not-for-profit tutoring and writing workshop center in New York.

Essentially, Quarterly.co has customers paying $100 per year for whatever the company sends.

For more on this article, please go here.]]> Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111229-193919 Marne Semick Fri, 30 Dec 2011 00:39:19 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=12&entry=entry111229-193919 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111210-142439 2012 Marketing And Ad Budget Allocation (Technology Products or Services)
Product or Service % of Budget
Digital 50.1%
Events 23.9
Print 13.9
Broadcast 5.1
Other 6.9
Source: IDG, November 2011
The survey found that digital spend is evenly split between branded tech media sites, with more than 51% and a combination of ad networks, exchanges without real-time bidding (RTB), and RTB systems. 39% plan to spend more on branded sites in 2012 than this year, and 31% of the respondents plan to increase ad network funding.
Sites For Planned Digital Spend in 2012
Type % Budgeted Spend
Branded Content 51.2% (39% spending more than 2011)
Ad networks 27.3% (31% spending more than 2011)
Ad exchanges/DSPs 15.3%
RTB 6.2%
Source: IDG, November 2011
As might be expected in a difficult economy, lead generation topped all digital budget categories with almost 27% followed by display/banner at just under 20% and search at almost 19%. As to what is driving digital media investments in 2012, audience composition, ROI and measurement capabilities, audience reach, and data targeting were selected by more than three-quarters of the respondents.
Digital Budget Spending Priorities 2012
Ad Type Share of Budget
Lead Generation 26.6%
Display/Banner 19.6
Search 18.8
Email 11.7
Sponsorship/Custom 9.7
Digital Video 7.8
Rich Media 5.9
Source: IDG, November 2011
By a wide margin, click through rate is the most important factor in campaign success with cost-per-engagement and interaction rate almost equal in importance. Vendors are significantly more likely to rely on social media indicators; agencies look to metrics that lend themselves to ROI computations.
Important Metric Evaluation Considerations
Metric % Utilizing
CTR (Click through rate) 80%
Cost per engagement 59%
Interaction rate 55%
Source: IDG, November 2011
Content marketing, which includes white papers, case studies, videos, custom websites, video and white papers, is among tech marketers’ top five spending priorities for 2012. Led by collateral at 71%, followed by webcasts/virtual events at 61%, videos at 59%, research at 55%, and articles/features at 54%, marketers are investing in a wide variety of content marketing or custom programs.
Custom Content Marketing Spending Priorities (% of Tech Marketers)
Category % of Tech Marketers Investing
Collateral 71%
Webcasts/virtual events 61
Videos 59
Research 5
Articles/features 54
SEO, SEM, SMO optimized 51
Source: IDG, November 2011
Agencies are much more inclined to use custom within media sites/programs than vendors (50% vs. 28%). When asked about the biggest challenges in producing marketing content, marketers cited producing enough material, creating engaging content and measuring the results. Approximately two-thirds of the marketers indicate they will outsource one or more projects involving content creation, creative development, ad unit creation and online production/services.
Content Marketing Content Challenges (% Respondents Considering “Biggest”)
Challenge % of Respondents
Producing enough content 49%
Producing engaging content 48
Measuring results 39
Delivering content to right audience 37
Lack of budget 37
Lack of consistent content strategy 32
Lack of talent to produce content 31
Source: IDG, November 2011
75% of respondents noted that programs are meeting or exceeding expectations, though issues exist around lack of standard metrics, a shortage of experience with social media, and lack of budget. When compared to mobile marketing, social is out front in adoption, 95% to 64%. This indicates that for many marketers, social has advanced beyond the experimental stage unlike mobile. Of note is that almost half of the marketers will devote funds to tablet ads next year.
Matthew Yorke, President, IDG Global Solutions, concludes by saying that “... marketers are following their customers and prospects who are relying on social, mobile, and video in rapidly increasing numbers... a multiplatform world has been added to the multichannel world... “
For additional information about the study, including links to charts and slides, please go here.
Respondents to the IDG survey included 185 tech marketers and 89 agency professionals. 86% of the participants were from the United States.
]]> http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111210-142439 Marne Semick Sat, 10 Dec 2011 19:24:39 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=12&entry=entry111210-142439 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111129-211455
Best,

Marne

By OWEN FLETCHER
Growth in China's e-commerce sector is shifting toward sites that sell goods directly to consumers over those that focus on bartering between individuals, boosting online retailers such asBeijing Jingdong Century Trading Co. and forcing industry giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. to adapt.


Companies like Jingdong, which sells a broad range of goods on its 360buy.com website, are raising funds and racing to expand their share of online business-to-consumer sales in China, a market that is forecast to triple in size over the next two years.
Alibaba Group has responded to the intensifying competition by splitting up its dominant Chinese e-commerce sites—Taobao Mall, which hosts online stores run by other businesses, and Taobao Marketplace, a trading service that links individual buyers and sellers—into separate units to help drive growth.
Meanwhile, a growing number of online retailers selling niche products like lingerie or electronics are opening up shop, while companies that haven't traditionally focused on e-commerce, such as Chinese search engine Baidu Inc., also are looking to jump into the growing market.
"Generally what we see is competition will become more fierce in [the business-to-consumer market] in the near future, but it's still more promising than [the consumer-to-consumer market] in the long term," says Duncan Clark, chairman of Beijing-based research firm BDA China Ltd. Online sales by businesses are taking market share from consumer-trading websites in China, especially in the country's biggest cities, Mr. Clark says.
Center of the Battle
Sales on Chinese business-to-consumer websites are expected to more than triple to 650 billion yuan, or about $102 billion, in 2013 from around 198 billion yuan, or $31 billion, this year, Beijing research firm Analysys International estimates. By 2013, business-to-consumer sales will account for 47% of total online sales in China, up from 25% this year, Analysys says.

For the rest of the article, please go here ]]> Online Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111129-211455 Marne Semick Wed, 30 Nov 2011 02:14:55 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=11&entry=entry111129-211455 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111122-123904
At 154, a Digital Milestone
By JEREMY W. PETERS
The Atlantic owes its name and legacy to the 154-year-old monthly magazine founded by New England literary greats like Ralph Waldo Emerson. But in October, the company marked a very modern milestone: digital advertising revenue exceeded print advertising revenue for the first time.

For any magazine publisher to take in the bulk of its advertising revenue from online sources is incredibly rare. Publishing industry executives said they were not aware of any examples of a brand as prominent as the Atlantic doing so.


The cover of The Atlantic’s December issue. The magazine was founded in 1857.
But for the last few years, The Atlantic has been undergoing a gradual evolution from a magazine publisher to a multimedia company with a collection of successful Web sites that also happens to put out a magazine once a month.

“When I started in ’08, digital was 9 percent of our total ad revenue,” said Jay Lauf, publisher of The Atlantic. “With digital, everybody in the business is always talking about trading print dimes for digital dollars. Well, for the first time we’re actually beating print.” October’s split was 51 percent digital, 49 percent print.


The Atlantic, which expects to make about $18.6 million from advertising this year, or slightly more than half of its total revenue, said the growth in its online share of business was not because of a decline in the share of print revenue. It sold more ads in the October issue of the magazine than it had in any other issue since David Bradley bought it from Mortimer B. Zuckerman in 1999, Mr. Lauf said.

Traffic at TheAtlantic.com and its successful news and aggregation site The Atlantic Wire has grown despite the loss of some popular bloggers like Andrew Sullivan, who announced in February that he was leaving The Atlantic for The Daily Beast.

Over the last five months, Quantcast measured global monthly visitors to TheAtlantic.com at 5.4 million — 3.6 million of them in the United States. That is more than The Daily Beast’s 3.3 million monthly domestic visitors, but less than Time.com’s 9.1 million, according to Quantcast. Monthly domestic traffic to The Atlantic Wire is another 1.3 million visitors.

Many magazine executives see their advertising businesses gradually relying more and more on digital revenue even if few of their companies are as far along as The Atlantic. But getting there will most likely take a lot longer for others than it did for The Atlantic, which is smaller and has lower advertising rates compared with other publications in the so-called thought leader category like The New Yorker.

Keeping the brand strong and valuable across all platforms will be what keeps the company growing, said Robin Steinberg, director of publishing investment and activation at MediaVest. “While I applaud the evolution of their overall business model, the total strength in revenue of their brand is what’s most important.”]]> Online Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111122-123904 Marne Semick Tue, 22 Nov 2011 17:39:04 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=11&entry=entry111122-123904 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111114-183122
By Angel Jennings

The Federal Trade Commission said Tuesday that it settled complaints against two online companies that deceptively collected personal information from consumers, including young children.

The founder of Skid-e-kids, a social networking site for preteens, was charged with violating the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act by gathering the names, ages, and email addresses from children without obtaining prior parental approval.

More information here read this article]]> Site Design http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry111114-183122 Marne Semick Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:31:22 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=11&entry=entry111114-183122 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110930-130005 By BENEDICT CAREY
Published: September 29, 2011

However grumpy people are when they wake up, and whether they stumble to their feet in Madrid, Mexico City or Minnetonka, Minn., they tend to brighten by breakfast time and feel their moods taper gradually to a low in the late afternoon, before rallying again near bedtime, a large-scale study of posts on the social media site Twitter found.

For more on this article, go here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/30/scien ... .html?_r=1
]]> Social Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110930-130005 Marne Semick Fri, 30 Sep 2011 17:00:05 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=09&entry=entry110930-130005 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110912-135029 By Tony Bradley, PCWorld

30 Days With Google+: Day 29

I devoted yesterday to whining about the five things that bug me the most about Google+. Today, I take a look at the other side of the coin with the five things I like most about Google+ after going through the 30 Days With Google+ experience.


1. No limit. I'll admit I can get a bit wordy at times (settle down--that's enough out of you), but it is very annoying to type out a status update and have it rejected because it exceeds some arbitrary character limit.


I like that Google+ doesn't limit my posts and lets me edit them after the fact.
Twitter is Twitter, and its 140-character limit is one of its defining characteristics. I get it. But, on Facebook the status update character limit was 420, and was just recently bumped up to 500. The new limit is much better than the old one--I find that most of my status updates can fit in 500 characters. But, 500 is still arbitrary, and I still exceed it.

I love that on Google+ I can type indefinitely if I choose and there is no limit to the length of my posts. In fact, I see a number of people who have Tumblr blogs and then post links from Google+, and I wonder if it wouldn't make more sense to drop Tumblr and just use Google+ as the blogging platform in the first place.

2. Edit Posts. Another nice thing about Google+ is that I can edit my posts. Even after I have finished my thought and posted it, I often discover typos or error in grammar that I'd like to correct, or I may have another thought that I would like to add. It is nice that Google+ lets me simply click on the little drop-down arrow at the upper right of the post and click "Edit this post" to make changes.

With Facebook, there is about a 15-second (maybe shorter) "oh shit!" window where I can delete a post or comment after I enter it and Facebook will recognize that I want to take back what I said and will allow me to edit it. After that window is up, though, I have to delete the post and start over.

On a semi-related editing note, I can also hit enter to insert carriage returns and create paragraphs in Google+ rather than having to hit Shift-Enter or end up accidentally posting prematurely.

3. Following. I like being able to follow the streams of others who may not necessarily be part of my social network, and the fact that others who are not in my social network can follow me. It is a great way to stay informed and learn interesting new things--many of which I, in turn, share with those who are following me.

Of course, it only has value if the person actually posts things to Public. Mark Zuckerberg may be posting 100 times a day, but he has yet to share anything with Public, so as far as I can tell he just doesn't use Google+. There seems to be little value in following Mark Zuckerberg, yet I--and nearly 500,000 others on Google+--continue to follow and hold out hope that we will one day grace us with some wit and wisdom.

For more on this article go here: http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/a ... oogle.html]]> Social Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110912-135029 Marne Semick Mon, 12 Sep 2011 17:50:29 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=09&entry=entry110912-135029 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110419-155131
By Eric J. Smith
NetNewsCheck, April 19, 2011 9:44 AM EDT
It appears the days of digging through the newspaper help-wanted ads and circling prospective jobs in red ink are fast becoming a distant memory. In perhaps one of the most telling statistics of the flagging print news industry, a new report from Borrell Associates found that employment want ads, which once dominated print newspapers, have largely shifted online.

In it's "2011 Online Recruitment Marketing Outlook: Are the Jobs Ever Coming Back," Borrell Associates found that online recruitment advertising has become a $5 billion business, representing nearly 15% of all online advertising. More significant, the report found that human resources professionals "are spending 57% of their entire media budgets on online recruitment."

And the amount of money being channeled into online media is continuing to grow. In 2010, recruiters spent $8.9 billion on newspaper, television, radio and online advertising. That is expected to rise 9% in 2011, wirth a majority going to online outlets. The research and consulting firm predicted that by next year, online will comprise 67% of all recruitment media buying.

Last year, print newspapers -- which once dominated the help-wanted advertising category -- brought in only one-tenth of the $10.3 billion it made from help-wanted advertising at its peak in 2000.

All told, however, media is only about 16% of the $55 billion recruiters pay to locate candidates. A majority of that money goes to recruitment agencies.

**

I like the part where it says "the amount of money being channeled into online media is continuing to grow". I'm finding that budgets are coming back and advertisers are also spending more of their budget online.

Please comment and share.

Marne]]> Marketing http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110419-155131 Marne Semick Tue, 19 Apr 2011 19:51:31 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=04&entry=entry110419-155131 http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110303-204843
This weekend, every Taiji household found a copy of The Cove in their mailbox.
In a surprise move shrouded in secrecy, film director Louie Psihoyos, in conjunction with several anonymous Japanese groups, arranged for 2000 copies of a Japanese-dubbed version of The Cove to be mailed to all residents of the coastal town. Most are aware of the controversy surrounding their town yet few have been able to view the film.
OPS has also put a free version for viewers outside the country, on The Cove website.
A theatrical release last summer was marred by incidents of protest by extreme nationalists, forcing several theaters to cancel. Despite dozens of awards and international acclaim, The Cove has had few viewers within Japan.

"The people of Taiji deserve to know what millions of others around the world have learned about their town," said Director Louie Psihoyos. "We here at OPS hope that when the Japanese people watch this film in the safety of their own homes, they may see that a few fishermen’s profits are giving a whole nation a black eye, not them."

A DVD subtitled version of film has also been released by Tokyo-based distributor, Medallion Media, slated for traditional sale and rental outlets. Ads for the film have been seen in Japan on TV, print and subway monitors.

The arrival of The Cove in Taiji coincides with reports that fishermen have ended the annual dolphin hunt one month early. Tarps used to shield their work and other equipment has been washed and put away. Some speculate that the fishermen have hidden evidence of the slaughter in anticipation of increased interest in the town.

OPS is grateful to the many who helped to make this happen. To our brave supporters in Japan who oversaw the delivery, to Bobby Sager who underwrote the dubbed version, along with all other donors.
To all who share our vision of ending the capture and slaughter of dolphins.
We thank you.

More information on this article, go here. http://thecovemovie.com/WatchTheTrailer.htm

The Oceanic Preservation Society is a charitable organization that we support.
]]> OMD News http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/index.php?entry=entry110303-204843 Marne Semick Fri, 04 Mar 2011 01:48:43 GMT http://www.onlinemediadiva.com/pblog/comments.php?y=11&m=03&entry=entry110303-204843