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lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After reading this chapter, you will be able to:
■ Understand the difference between traditional online marketing and the
new socialmobile-local marketing platforms and the relationships between
social, mobile, and local marketing.
■ Understand the social marketing process from fan acquisition to sales and
the marketing capabilities of social marketing platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.
■ Identify the key elements of a mobile marketing campaign.
■ Understand the capabilities of location-based local marketing. F a c e b o o k :
P u t t i n g S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g t o Wo r k lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173
hen Facebook issued its stock for
sale in an initial public offering on WMa y 18, 2012, it followed
a very long build-up of excitement based on the
belief that the company would turn into a marketing
behemoth to rival or exceed Google, Yahoo, and
Amazon. Facebook was, according to some analysts,
the next Google in terms of an advertising platform
and possibly even an e-commerce platform that
could compete with Amazon. Facebook raised $16
billion in the IPO, placing it in the “Big League” of
e-commerce stock offerings. Offered at $38 a share,
Facebook’s share price fell dramatically in
subsequent months to a low of $17.50 in September
2012 on investor fears that Facebook would be unable
to increase its advertising revenues fast enough to ©
justify its price. Flash forward to August 2015: digitallife/Alamy
Facebook’s shares are well on their way to tripling their original offering price. In the
past year, Facebook has continually implemented new ways to put targeted ads in front
of its increasingly mobile users. It appears to be succeeding, at least for now.
Although Facebook initially flubbed its shift to mobile devices, the social network
giant has made steady progress toward an effective mobile strategy. Throughout 2012,
Facebook redesigned its Facebook app specifically for smartphones, introducing ads into
users’ News Feeds, and creating a new kind of ad called “app-install ads,” which are ads
paid for by Facebook app developers that encourage users to download their apps (usually
for free). App-install ads and in-app ads became Facebook’s secret weapon that investors
had not even heard about. Facebook was aided by a shift away from mobile browsers to
apps: in 2015, more than half of mobile users worldwide regularly use brand, product, or
store apps, and over 85% of smartphone mobile time is spent inside apps.
Advertisers display ads within these apps, and Facebook shares the ad fees with the
app developers. App-install ads, and ads within apps, are the largest single source of
Facebook mobile ads. There are an estimated 10 million apps available on Facebook, and
users install nearly 30 million apps every day. These apps range from games like Candy
Crush Saga, FarmVille, and Words With Friends, to music apps like Spotify and Pandora,
to charity-oriented apps like Social Vibe and Charity Trivia. In-app ads have an advantage
over standard News Feed ads: they are not perceived to be as disruptive or 421
and Exchange Commission, July 31, 2015;
“Consumers Spend 85% of Their
Time on Smartphones in Apps, but SOURCES: Facebook, Inc.
Only 5 Apps See Heavy Use,” by Report on Form 10-Q for the
Sarah Perez, Techcrunch.com, June six months ended June 30, 22, 2015; “One Million and
2015, filed with the Securities lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 422
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g Counting! Little Passports to
Facebook has more than 2 million businesses advertising on its platform in 2015, the Deliver Its Millionth Package
majority of which are small businesses, and over 30 million small businesses have This
Spring,” Marketwired.com, April Facebook pages.
16, 2015; “Facebook Counts 2
Facebook has made a number of changes to its advertising toolkit in order to simplify Million Active Advertisers, Mostly
the process of placing and targeting ads on its site for small business owners without
Small Businesses,” by Jennifer
professional marketing staffs. Its interface now allows advertisers to specify their
Saba, Reuters.com, February 24,
2015; “A Year Later, $19 Billion
objectives, such as increasing likes, or increasing traffic to their Web site, or converting for
more visitors to sales. They can also choose where to place the ads—either in the WhatsApp Doesn’t Sound so Crazy,” by Josh Constine,
Facebook News Feed or the right side column. Advertisers can target demographics, as Techcrunch.com, February 19,
well as general characteristics that Facebook users indicate in their profile, such as age, 2015; “How Social Media Can Make Your Small Business Go
gender, education, and employment. Facebook has also added a tracking pixel, which Gangbusters,” by Bruce
allows advertisers to track customers who visit their Web site as a result of clicking a Freeman, Theweek.com, annoying as News Facebook ad. Feed ads, and users
One such business using Facebook’s new advertising tools is Little Passports, a firm are more willing to
created by two moms who wanted to design an inspiring and fun way for kids to learn experience the
about the United States and other countries. Little Passports is aimed at parents of young inconvenience of
children ages 5–12, with newer options available for even younger children. Its business being exposed to ads
model is a subscription service that sends children monthly packages that take kids on in return for a free
virtual trips where they learn geography, history, and social life. Subscriptions are $11.95 game. a month. In 2015, over 500
In 2014, Little Passports began a Facebook advertising campaign. The company ran million Facebook
ads featuring a photo of its Explorer Kit. Surrounding text urged people to subscribe to members access the
the service. Co-founder Amy Norman was able to choose who would see the ads based on social network solely
gender, interests, location, relationship status, education, whether the person was from their mobile
expecting a child, and the type of mobile device used to access the ads (iOS vs Android). devices, representing
She also used a feature called Custom Audience to reach out to mothers who had a college about a third of its 1.5
background and read selected parenting magazines. Another tool that proved useful was billion monthly active
Facebook’s LookAlike Audiences. LookAlike Audiences uses customer e-mail addresses users. Mobile now
provided by advertisers, looks at the demographic and behavioral trends in that group, comprises over 75% of
and then generates a list of additional prospects based on its database of North American its total advertising
Facebook users (about 260 million people). Facebook pushes the ad to these “look-alikes.” revenues, up from
If this sounds spooky, it is. But Facebook assures us that all the personal names are 50% in recent years, replaced with codes. and from nearly zero
In just a few months, Little Passport’s ads attracted over 1,500 user comments, all just a few years ago.
positive. In June 2014, the company spent about $30,000 on Facebook ads and its revenue Another factor in
for the month was about $130,000. After running the ad for six months, in December Facebook’s
Little Passports spent $150,000 on Facebook advertising and its revenue rose to $700,000. turnaround in social
Facebook advertising costs increased five-fold, and revenue advanced by mobile marketing is its success with small local businesses. lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173
F a c e b o o k : P u t t i n g S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g t o W o r k 423
5.4 times, a little faster than the cost. Nolan believes the Facebook campaign was worth Year 2014 Results,”
the expenditure because it tripled Little Passport’s customer base in six months. Ms. Facebook.com, January 28,
2015; “More Than Half a Billion
Norman also felt that Facebook’s tracking pixel was a game changer because she could People Access Facebook Via
see exactly how well the ads were performing. In 2015, Little Passports sold its millionth Mobile,” by Anthony Ha, Techcrunch.com, January 28, subscription package. 2015;
Until recently, investors in Facebook wondered if it would be able to continue to
“Facebook Extends Reach with
New Advertising Platform,” Jack
grow its advertising revenue. Marketers wondered if Facebook ads really worked. Does
Marshall, Wall Street Journal,
it mean anything if millions of Facebook users Like your marketing campaign? Do Likes
September 22, 2014; “Facebook
Tries to Muscle in on YouTube,”
turn into sales? Is Facebook better for marketing (brand recognition and awareness) by
than it is for driving sales through advertisements? And, if Facebook’s marketing Mike Shields and Reed Albergotti,
platform does work, how well does it work when compared to other online marketing
Wall Street Journal, September
techniques such as search, e-mail, display ads, and affiliate programs? 11,
Facebook’s marketing success on both the desktop and mobile devices is currently 2014; “Facebook Is Shifting From
based on the insertion of ads in users’ News Feeds and display ads in the right column of Being a Social Network to a
the home page. Currently an estimated 1 in 20 News Feed items are ads. When the ads Mere
App Platform,” by Ben Austin,
reach 1 in 10 News Feed items, how will users react? How about 1 in 5? Zuckerberg, along
The Guardian, September 2014;
with investors and marketers, is concerned that putting more ads in the News Feed is not “How
Facebook Sold You Krill Oil,” by
the answer to sustaining future growth. Facebook will have to come up with some other
Vindu Goel, New York Times,
ad opportunities, especially on the mobile platform. The most likely candidate: video
August 2, 2014; Facebook, Inc.
Report on Form 10-Q for the six
advertising using short video clips, and of course, challenging Google’s YouTube as a months ended June 30, 2014,
display platform for full-length videos and TV shows. In 2014, Facebook introduced an filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, July 24,
Autoplay feature, which allows videos to play automatically in the News Feed. Facebook 2014;
has also reached out to some of Google’s video content producers and encouraged them
“Facebook Answers Critics with a
to consider distributing their videos on Facebook. This is yet another sign that Facebook Mobile Ad Surge,” by Reed
is striving to become much more than just a social network site, and is trying to grow into
Albergotti, Wall Street Journal,
becoming a video platform, an app platform, and an entire ecosystem. Facebook’s July
23, 2014; “When Advertising on
purchases of Instagram for $1 billion in 2012 and WhatsApp for $22 billion in 2014 are Facebook Can be a Waste of
also a sign that Facebook fully appreciates the urgency to find new sources of revenue,
Money,” by Eilene Zimmerman,
New York Times, June 23, 2014;
but their commitment to growing these new platforms before monetizing them shows
“Facebook Says There Are Now
patience and confidence in their long term strategy. 30 Million Small Business with
Facebook’s financial results in 2014 and 2015 have quieted Wall Street’s doubts that
Active Pages, Including 19M on
it could become a mobile advertising juggernaut. Facebook’s 2014 revenue was nearly Mobile,” by Anthony Ha, Techcrunch.com, June 3, 2014;
$12.5 billion, up significantly from $7.8 billion in 2013. In the second quarter of 2015, “A Social Media
Facebook earned over $4 billion in revenue, its best quarter ever, and most importantly,
Marketer Assesses Facebook’s
Advertising Platform,” by Eilene
registered consistent “stickiness” rates, which had concerned many investors.
Zimmerman, New York Times,
Marketers may still have doubts about Facebook’s effectiveness, but Facebook has January 15, 2014; “Facebook Revamps Ads to Compete With
taken a number of steps to prove itself to marketers with better tracking tools. In October
Google,” by Eilene Zimmerman,
2014 Facebook launched a new advertising platform called Atlas. Atlas is a consumer
New York Times, January 15,
tracking took suited to the mobile ad platform, where traditional cookies do not work.
2014; “Facebook’s Stock Soars Amid Rosy
Atlas will help marketers identify Facebook users who have seen, or interacted with
Growth Expectations,” by Vindu
Facebook ads that appear on Facebook, other Web sites, or in Facebook apps. Atlas should
Goel, New York Times, July 25,
2013; “Why Facebook’s Mobile
go a long way in helping advertisers understand how well Facebook works. Ads Are Working Better Than
February 16, 2015; “Facebook
Google’s,” Timothy Senovec,
Reports Fourth Quarter and Full lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 424
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g
HuffingtonPost.com, July 25, 2013; purchase decisions are
“Facebook Is Erasing Doubts on increasingly driven by
Mobile,” by Vindu Goel, New York
Times, July 24, 2013; “The Facebook Ads Benchmark Report,” by Salesforce.com, 2013; “Facebook’s Growth Slows,” by Shayndi the conversations,
Raice, Wall Street Journal, July 27, choices, tastes, and 2012; “Facebook Combats opinions of the
Criticism Over Ads,” by Shayndi Raice, Wall Street Journal, June 12, 2012.
7.1 INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL, MOBILE, AND LOCAL consumer’s social MARKETING network. Social marketing is all about businesses participating in and shaping this social process.
Social, mobile, and local marketing have transformed the online marketing landscape. Before
2007, Facebook was a fledgling company limited to college students. Apple had not yet FROM THE
announced the iPhone. Online marketing consisted largely of creating a corporate Web site, DESKTOP TO THE
buying display ads on Yahoo, purchasing AdWords on Google, and sending e-mail. The SMARTPHONE
workhorse of online marketing was the display ad that flashed brand messages to millions of AND TABLET
users who were not expected to respond immediately, ask questions, or make observations. Today, social, mobile,
The primary measure of success was how many “eyeballs” (unique visitors) a Web site and local marketing
produced, and how many “impressions” a marketing campaign generated. An impression was are the fastest growing
one ad shown to one person. Both of these measures were carryovers from the world of forms of online
television, which measures marketing in terms of audience size and ad views.
marketing (Figure 7.1).
FROM EYEBALLS TO CONVERSATIONS It’s taken eight years for this new landscape
After 2007, everything began to change, with the rapid growth of Facebook and other social to fully emerge since
network sites, the explosive growth of smartphones beginning with Apple iPhone in 2007, and 2007, and firms are still
the growing interest in local marketing. What’s different about the new world of social-mobile- learning how to use
local marketing and advertising are the related concepts of “conversations” and the new social and
“engagement.” Marketing today is based on businesses marketing themselves as partners in mobile marketing
multiple online conversations with their customers, potential customers, and even critics. Your technologies.
brand is being talked about on the Web and social media (that’s the conversation part). Today, By 2012, mobile
marketing your firm and brands requires you to locate, identify, and participate in these marketing had already
conversations. Social marketing means all things social: listening, discussing, interacting, overtaken social
empathizing, and engaging. Rather than bombarding your audience with fancier, louder ads, marketing using
instead have a conversation with them and engage them in your brand. The emphasis in online traditional Web
marketing has shifted from a focus on eyeballs to a focus on participating in customer-oriented browsers on the Web.
conversations. In this sense, social marketing and advertising is not simply a “new ad channel,” In 2015, spending on
but a collection of technology-based tools for communicating with shoppers. mobile marketing will
In the past, businesses could tightly control their brand messaging and lead consumers be
down a funnel of cues that ended in a purchase. That is not true of social marketing. Consumer
I n t r o d u c t i o n t o S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 425 FIGURE 7.1
SOCIAL, MOBILE, AND LOCAL MARKETING 2014–2017
The amount spent on mobile marketing far exceeds the amount spent on social marketing and is
rapidly overtaking the amount spent on local online marketing as well.
SOURCE: Based on data from eMarketer, Inc., 2015a, eMarketer, Inc., 2015z; BIA/Kelsey, 2015a.
more than double the amount spent on social marketing. By 2017, it is estimated that mobile
marketing spending will account for around $48 billion annually, while social marketing will be
about $14 billion. While social marketing is expected to grow by around 30% a year for the
next several years, mobile will be growing at almost 60% in 2015, slowing down to 14% in 2017
as the United States market becomes saturated with mobile ads (eMarketer, Inc., 2015a). This
figure underestimates the total social marketing spending because of the high percentage of
visits to social networks that originate from a mobile device. For instance, Twitter reports that
over 75% of their monthly active users access Twitter from a mobile device; about 30% of
Facebook’s active user base are mobile-only members (eMarketer, Inc., 2015b; Twitter, 2015).
A substantial part of the mobile marketing spending should be counted as “social” marketing.
Nevertheless, the figure indicates the extraordinary impact that mobile devices are having on
marketing expenditures. Local online marketing was almost 70% larger than mobile in 2014,
but by 2017, it is estimated that mobile will surpass local online marketing. As with social and
mobile, there is significant overlap between local and mobile and social marketing, with much
of local marketing also either social or mobile, or both. lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 426
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g FIGURE 7.2
ONLINE MARKETING PLATFORMS
Traditional desktop marketing, including most of local marketing to local audiences, remains the
largest part of all online marketing. Mobile marketing is aimed often at local audiences and is the
fastest growing form of online marketing, followed closely by social marketing on social networks.
Mobile local is in its infancy but it is also growing far faster than traditional desktop marketing.
SOURCE: Based on data from eMarketer, Inc., 2015a; eMarketer, Inc., 2015z; BIA/Kelsey, 2015a.
Figure 7.2 puts the social-mobile-local forms of advertising into the context of the total
online advertising market. Here you can see that traditional online marketing (browser-based
search and display ads, and e-mail marketing) still constitutes the majority of all online
marketing, but it is growing much more slowly than socialmobile-local marketing. By 2017, it
is expected that social-mobile-local marketing will be more than 50% of all online marketing.
The marketing dollars are following customers and shoppers from the desktop computer to
mobile devices, with smartphones having a substantial lead over tablets.
THE SOCIAL, MOBILE, LOCAL NEXUS
Social, mobile, and local digital marketing are self-reinforcing and connected. For instance, as
mobile devices become more powerful, they are more useful for accessing Facebook and
other social sites. As mobile devices become more widely adopted, they can be used by
customers to find local merchants, and for merchants to alert customers in their
neighborhood to special offers. Over time, these will become more overlapped as the three
platforms become more tightly coupled.
About 78% of Facebook’s ad revenue is generated by its mobile audience. Mobile
constitutes an even larger share of Twitter’s ad revenues—over 90%! Local marketing and
mobile are highly related: local advertisers most often target mobile devices. And a
considerable amount of mobile ad spending comes from local advertisers. The strong ties
among social, mobile, and local marketing have significant implications for managing your own lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 427
marketing campaign in this new environment. The message is that when you design a social
marketing campaign, you must also consider that your lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 428
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g
customers will be accessing the campaign using mobile devices, and often they will also be
looking for local content. Social-mobile-local must be seen in an integrated management framework.
In the sections that follow we will examine social, mobile, and local marketing more
closely. The focus will be on describing the primary marketing tools of each platform and how
to envision and manage a marketing campaign on each platform. 7.2 SOCIAL MARKETING
Social marketing differs markedly from traditional online marketing. The objectives of
traditional online marketing are to put your business’s message in front of as many visitors as
possible and hopefully encourage them to come to your Web site to buy products and services,
or to find out more information. The more “impressions” (ad views) you get, and the more
unique visitors to your site, the better. Traditional online marketing never expected to listen to
customers, much less have a conversation with them, any more than TV advertisers expected to hear from viewers.
In social marketing, the objective is to encourage your potential customers to become fans
of your company’s products and services, and engage with your business by entering into a
conversation with it. Your further objective is to encourage your business’s fans to share their
enthusiasm with their friends, and in so doing create a community of fans online. Ultimately,
the point is to strengthen the brand and drive sales, and to do this by increasing your “share
of online conversation.” There is some reason to believe that social marketing is more cost
effective than traditional marketing although this is still being explored.
SOCIAL MARKETING PLAYERS
There are hundreds of social network sites in the United States and worldwide, but the most
popular sites (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Tumblr) account for over
90% of all visits. (See Chapter 11, Section 11.1 for a full discussion of social networks.)
While the number of monthly unique visitors is a good measure of market reach, it is not
helpful in understanding engagement—the amount and intensity of user involvement in a site.
One measure of engagement is the amount of time users spend on a site. Figure 7.3 illustrates
engagement at the top social network sites.
On measures of engagement, Facebook once again dominates, accounting for 85% of the
total month visitor minutes, a whopping 230 billion minutes per month in the United States.
The average Facebook user spent more than 18 hours a month on Facebook. Tumblr takes
second place, followed by Pinterest and Twitter.
For a manager of a social marketing campaign, these findings suggest that in terms of reach
and engagement, the place to start a social campaign is Facebook. Yet visitors to the other
leading social sites collectively account for an additional 15% of the social market space, and
therefore, a social marketing campaign also has to include them at some point. It helps that
social network users use multiple social sites. Facebook users lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 429 dark social
Instagram. In addition, marketers need to be aware of what has come to be known as dark those forms of social
social. Dark social refers to those forms of social sharing that occur off the major social sharing that occur off
networks, through alternative communication tools such as interpersonal conversations, the major social
group meetings, and friendships, not to mention e-mail, instant messages, texts, and mobile networks, through
messaging apps. While online social network users spend over 30 hours a month on average alternative
on all networks combined, there are 720 total hours in a month. Therefore, about 4% of all communication tools
social life in a month involves online social networks, while 96% does not. such as e-mail, instant messages, texts, and mobile messaging
THE SOCIAL MARKETING PROCESS apps
At first glance the large number of different social sites is confusing, each with a unique user
experience to offer, from Twitter’s micro blogging text messaging service, to Tumblr’s blogging FIGURE 7.3
ENGAGEMENT AT TOP SOCIAL NETWORKS
capability, and to graphical social sites like Pinterest and Instagram. Yet they can all be
approached with a common framework. Figure 7.4 illustrates a social marketing framework
that can be applied to all social, mobile, and local marketing efforts.
There are five steps in the social marketing process: Fan acquisition, engagement,
amplification, community, and brand strength (sales). Each of these steps in the process can
be measured. The metrics of social marketing are quite different from those of traditional Web
marketing or television marketing. This is what makes social marketing so different—the
objectives and the measures. This will become more apparent as we describe marketing on specific social sites. FIGURE 7.4
THE SOCIAL MARKETING PROCESS Visitors spend significantly more time
The social marketing process has five steps. on Facebook than any other social network. SOURCE: Based on data from comScore, 2015a;
Social marketing campaigns begin with fan acquisition, which involves using any of a comScore, 2015b;
variety of means, from display ads to News Feed and page pop-ups, to attract people to your Statista.com, 2015;
Facebook page, Twitter feed, or other platform like a Web page. It’s getting your brand “out MacMillan and Rusli,
there” in the stream of social messages. Display ads on social sites have a social dimension
(sometimes called “display ads with social features” or simply “social ads”). Social ads 2014; Frommer, 2015.
encourage visitors to interact and do something social, such as participate in a contest, obtain
a coupon, or obtain free services for attracting friends. are likely to be users
The next step is to generate engagement, which involves using a variety of tools to at Twitter, Pinterest,
encourage users to interact with your content and brand located on your Facebook or Web LinkedIn, and
pages. You can think of this as “starting the conversation” around your brand. You want your lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 430
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g fans to talk about
typically have only three to four close friends with whom they can discuss confidential matters, your content and
and a larger set of around 20 friends with whom they have two-way communications (mutual products. You can
friends). Let’s use 20 as a reasonable number of mutual friends for marketing purposes. For generate engagement
marketers, this means that if they can attract one fan and encourage that fan to share his or through attractive
her approval with his or her friends, the message can be amplified twenty times: 20 friends of photos, interesting
the one fan can be influenced. Best of all: the friends of fans are free. Marketers pay to attract text content, and
only the initial fan and they are not charged by social sites (currently) for the amplification that blogger reports, with can result. plenty of
Once you have gathered enough engaged fans, you will have created the foundation for opportunities for
a community—a more or less stable group of fans who are engaged and users to express fan acquisition opinions. You can also
attracting people to your marketing messages provide links to Pinterest photos of your products or fan comments on blog sites like Tumblr. Once you have engagement engaged visitors, you
encouraging visitors to interact with your content and brand amplification can begin to use social site features to amplify your
encouraging visitors to share their Likes and comments with their friends messages by encouraging users to tell their friends by clicking a Like or +1 button, or by sending a message to their community followers on Twitter.
a stable group of fans engaged and communicating with one another over a substantial period of Amplification
time about your brand social density refers to the number of interactions among members of a involves using the
group and reflects the “connectedness” of a group, even if these connections are forced on users inherent strength of
communicating with one another over a substantial period of time (say several months or social networks. On
more). Marketers have a number of tactics to nurture these communities, including inside Facebook, the
information on new products, price breaks for loyalty, and free gifts for bringing in new average user has 120
members. The ultimate goal is to enlarge your firm’s “share of the online conversation.” The “friends.” This
process ends with strengthening the brand and, hopefully, additional sales of products and includes all people
services. Brand strength can be measured in a variety of ways both online and offline, a subject they have ever
that is beyond the boundaries of this text (Ailawadi et al., 2003; Aaker, 1996; Simon and friended, including
Sullivan, 1993; Keller, 1993). people whom they
Ultimately, the point of marketing is to drive sales revenue. Measuring the impact of a don’t really know
social marketing campaign on brand strength and sales is still being explored by marketers, (and who don’t really
social site managers, and researchers, but generally the results are positive: social marketing know them).
campaigns drive sales. In 2015, most of the top social network sites, including Facebook, Facebook users
Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram, have added, or are in the processing of adding, social lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 431 commerce features,
are casual users who have a small set of perhaps 20 friends and relatives. While most have a such as Buy buttons
basic understanding of Facebook, it’s worthwhile to review the major features of Facebook and other shopping
before discussing its marketing potential. functionality that makes it even easier
Basic Facebook Features for the targets of
Facebook describes itself as having three pillars: News Feed, Timeline (Profile), and Search. those social
Facebook also has many other features that are equally important to its potential as a marketing campaigns
marketing platform. Table 7.1 describes these features. to act on them and
Reviewing Table 7.1, it is clear that Facebook is built to encourage people to reveal as make a purchase.
much personal information about themselves as feasible, including activities, behavior,
photos, music, movies, purchases, and preferences. One result is that Facebook is the world’s FACEBOOK
largest repository of deeply personal behavioral information on the Internet. Facebook knows MARKETING
a great deal more about its users than Google does about its users. Second, Facebook’s Nearly everyone
features are built to maximize the connections among people in the form of notifications, reading this book has
tagging, messaging, posting, and sharing. In many instances, the movement of personal a Facebook page.
information is so widespread that it is beyond the understanding of users and outside There are power
observers. The effect of these two factors is to greatly magnify the social density of the users who spend
Facebook audience. Social density refers to the number of interactions among members of a hours a day on the
group and reflects the “connectedness” of a group, even if these connections are forced on site, some with
users. For instance, some natural groups of people are not very “social” and few messages thousands of
flow among members. Other natural groups are loquacious and chatty with many messages “friends,” and there flowing among TABLE 7.1
BASIC FACEBOOK FEATURES F E AT U R E D E S C R I P T I O N Profile
As part of account creation, you create a profile that includes certain personal information. The
profile may also include photos and other media. Establishes baseline information that will be shared with friends. Friend search
Helps you find friends who are already using Facebook, as well as friends who are not, typically
by searching your e-mail contact list. Creates your baseline social network based on prior contacts. Timeline
A history of your actions on Facebook, including photos, history of posts, and comments to your
News Feed, as well as life events that you post and want others to see as a part of your profile.
Additions you make to your Timeline may appear on your friends’ News Feed. Creates additional links with friends. Tagging
Ability to tag photos, status updates, check-ins, or comments with the names of friends. Tagging
links to that person’s Timeline and News Feed. Your friends are notified they have been tagged,
and you are linked to their Timeline. Friends of your friends may also be notified. Whenever
Facebook detects the person in a new image, it notifies all those who have tagged the photo that
this friend appears in a new photo that you can link to. The tagging tool is designed to create
additional connections among users. News Feed
The center of the action on Facebook Home pages, News Feed is a continuously updated list of stories
from friends and Pages that you have liked on Facebook. Ads running in the News Feed are the major ad revenue producer
for Facebook. News Feed stories include status updates, photos, videos, links, app activity, and Likes. Provides a continual lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 432
C H A P T E R 7 S o c i a l , M o b i l e , a n d L o c a l M a r k e t i n g
stream of messages from friends and advertisers. Trending
Facebook’s version of trending topics; appears at top of
right-hand column next to News Feed Status update
A way to post your comments, observations, and location to all your friends. Like button
The ubiquitous Like button communicates your support of comments, photos, activities, brands, articles,
and products to your friends, and also to the Facebook social graph and third-party marketers. The
Like button lives on virtually all Facebook content including status updates, photos, comments,
brands, timelines, apps, and even ads. The Like button also appears on external sites, mobile and
social apps, and ads. These sites are utilizing Facebook's Like social plug-in, and when you Like
something outside of Facebook, it appears on your Timeline, where friends can comment on the
activity. The Like button is one way Facebook knows what other sites you visit. Apps
Facebook apps are built by third-party developers, and add functionality to Facebook. Apps run
the gamut from games (Candy Crush Saga; FarmVille) to photos (Instagram, now part of
Facebook), music (Spotify), and publications (Washington Post Social Reader). Your personal
information and that of your friends is shared with apps that you install. Most Facebook apps are
free, and most rely on revenues from advertising that they expose you to. Open Graph
A feature used by app developers to integrate their apps into the Facebook pages of users who sign
up for the app, and in that sense, it opens the Facebook social graph to the developer, who can
then use all the features of Facebook in the app. For instance, this feature allows your performance
on game apps to be sent to your Friend’s News Feeds. Supports the development of social apps
and increases links among users. Search
In July 2013, Facebook introduced Graph Search, a “social” search engine that searched your
social network for answers to queries. It was a “semantic” search engine insofar as it provided a
single answer rather than a list of links based on an algorithm’s estimate of user intentions. It was
also a “hybrid” search engine that relied on Bing to supplement results. In 2015, Facebook
significantly expanded its Search functionality. It now includes everyone’s public posts, Likes,
photos, and interests, and makes them available to all users of Facebook, friends or not. Like button
Facebook Marketing Tools gives users a chance
Facebook offers a number of marketing and advertising opportunities and tools for branding to share their feelings
and developing community on its site. about content and other objects they are viewing
Like Button The Like and Share buttons on Facebook, and similar buttons such as +1 on other members. The scope,
social sites, are perhaps the single most important element in the rise of social marketing. intensity, and depth
“Like” is the engine of social marketing. The Like button was introduced by Facebook on its of Facebook’s
own Web site in 2009 and rolled out as a plug-in to other Web sites in 2010. Unlike traditional repository of
Web advertising, the Like button gives users a chance to share their feelings about content personal information
and other objects they are viewing and Web sites they are visiting. It’s a way for users to and rich social
express their opinions to their friends about their Web experience. With Like buttons on network present
millions of Web sites, Facebook can track user behavior on other sites and then sell this extraordinary information to marketers. marketing
Like gives Big Data real meaning. Analysts estimate that each hour, Facebook records 30 opportunities.
million likes and processes 180 million posts and 9 million messages. Facebook’s Like and Share
buttons are embedded in more than 13 million Web sites worldwide (Bullas, 2015; Facebook, 2015; Lecher, 2015). lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 433 Brand Pages
adjunct to their main Web site. The purpose of a brand page is to develop fans of the brand Facebook’s early
by providing users opportunities to interact with the brand through comments, contests, and efforts at brand
offerings. Using social calls to action, such as “Like us on Facebook” and “Share,” brand pages marketing focused
can escape their isolation and make it more easily into users’ social networks, where friends on the development
can hear the message. In October 2015, Facebook announced that it would offer a new of brand pages as a
Shopping/Services tab for Facebook brand pages that will feature products and services, means for firms to
taking it further into the realm of social e-commerce. establish a direct
Social brand pages have many more social opportunities for fans to like and comment relationship with
than are typical of traditional Web pages. However, corporate Web sites have, over time, their current and
adopted many social features and the two are now often indistinguishable. potential customers.
Brand pages on Facebook typically attract more visitors than a brand’s Web site. Nearly all Fortune
Brands can get exposure on Facebook either organically or via paid advertisements. 1000 companies, and
Organic reach is free, and happens when fans see the brand’s updates and posts in their News hundreds of
Feed, or when others who are not fans see that content because a fan liked, commented, or thousands of smaller
shared the post (viral reach). In order to ensure that they get the exposure that they want for firms, have Facebook
their marketing messages, most companies choose one of the paid advertising formats brand pages, similar discussed below. to brand Web sites,
Facebook enables you to choose from a variety of different marketing objectives, on Facebook as an
including promoting your Page posts/ads (Page Post Engagement); obtaining Likes for
your Facebook page to grow your company’s audience and brand (Page Likes); getting people
to click through to your Web site (Clicks to Web sites); getting people to take certain actions
on your Web site (Web site Conversions); getting people to install an app (App Installs); getting
people to use an app (App Engagement); creating offers for people to redeem (Offer Claims);
and getting people to watch a video (Video Views).
Once you have chosen a marketing objective, the next decision is to whom you want to
target the advertisement. Facebook ads can be targeted based on location, age, interest,
gender, education level, relationship status, and political views, as well as to custom audiences
defined by the marketer. Facebook can also create what it calls a “lookalike audience” based
on demographics shared with the custom audience identified by the marketer.
Once the marketing objectives and audience have been determined, the next decision is
where to place the advertisement. Facebook has four basic locations from which to choose:
the News Feed, the right-hand column or sidebar section of Facebook pages, and the mobile
News Feed. Ads can also be placed within apps.
News Feed Page Post Ads The News Feed is the most prominent place for advertisements.
The News Feed is the center of the action for Facebook users and where Facebook users spend
most of their time because that is where posts from their friends appear. Page Post Ads appear
in a user’s News Feed along with all of the other posts and status updates that normally appear
from friends. Page Post Ads have a tiny tag that indicates that they are sponsored (i.e., are
advertisements) but otherwise look very similar to posts from friends. Sometimes the ads have
a social context (“John Smith and Jane Doe like Pottery Barn”) and can be liked, shared, and
commented on, just like any other post. Page Post Ads can contain text, photos, video, and
links. They can be used for many of the marketing objectives mentioned above, such as lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 434
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increasing brand engagement, obtaining Likes for the brand’s Facebook page, and encouraging
app installs and engagement. In 2015, Facebook is also pilot testing a Buy button that will
appear in News Feed Page Post Ads that will allow people to purchase items without leaving
Facebook. Companies pay to promote or boost Page Post Ads in order to extend their reach.
This has become increasingly important as Facebook has reduced the organic reach that brands
previously enjoyed for free in an effort to increase advertising revenues (Vahl, 2014; Ernoult, 2014).
Right-Hand Column Sidebar Ads These display ads are located in the right-hand column
or sidebar of Facebook pages. They are often used to direct users to offFacebook content such
as Web site landing pages and content offers. Facebook has recently reduced the number of
ads that appear in the right-hand column sidebar from seven to two, increased their size, and
made them consistent with the format of News Feed Page Post Ads in an effort to enhance their performance.
Mobile Ads Facebook introduced Facebook for Mobile in 2006. It now has nearly 1 billion
daily monthly active users as of June 2015. Users can also access Facebook using a mobile
browser although it is slower. In 2015, over 75% of Facebook ad revenue will come from its
mobile ad platform, and it is its fastest growing revenue stream Facebook Exchange
t on social sites to their friends, and friends of friends. The one tool (FBX)
that marketers cannot control. Currently free. a real-time bidding system that allows Brand Pages
Engagement and community building. Similar to a business Web
page, but much more social by encouraging user interaction and advertisers to target
response; ongoing discussions among the community of fans. their ads based on
Brand pages are currently free. Shop/Services tabs for brand pages personal information
allow companies to feature products and services for sale. provided by Facebook TABLE 7.2 News Feed Page Post Ads
Fan acquisition. Paid brand messages can be inserted into the News BASIC FACEBOOK
Feed. Requires payment. Buy button that can be embedded in MARKETING
News Feed Page Post Ads currently being tested. TOOLS Right-Hand Sidebar Ads
Fan acquisition. Display ads in the right-hand column (sidebar) M A R K E T I N G TO
similar to display ads elsewhere on the Web. Requires payment. O L D E S C R I P T I O N Mobile Ads
Fan acquisition and engagement. Mobile News Feed Page Post Ads
are delivered to smartphones and tablets. Requires payment. Like Button Amplification. A
Facebook Exchange (FBX) Facebook’s real-time ad exchange, which sells ads and retargets ads feature that allows
through online bidding. Advertisers place cookies on user users to express
browsers when they visit a site, and when they return to Facebook, they are shown ads on the support for
right side from the site they visited. Requires payment. c o n (e t
Marketer, Inc., 2015c). Mobile app install ads are those paid for by mobile app developers to e
persuade users to install their app. n lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 435 Because the
ad formats described above. Critics complain that the number of ads in the mobile News Feed smartphone screen is
becomes distracting and annoying. Mobile ads often take up the entire screen. There also is much smaller than
less targeting of mobile ads, which increases the likelihood users will see irrelevant ads. So far, regular computer
despite the annoyance, Facebook mobile users continue to sign up and view. screens, there is no room for sidebar ads
Facebook Exchange (FBX). Facebook Exchange (FBX) is a real-time bidding system that on the right-hand
allows advertisers to target their ads based on personal information provided by Facebook. column, so all mobile
FBX competes with Google’s display ad system DoubleClick and other realtime exchanges. ads need to be
Visitors to third-party Web sites are marked with a cookie, and can then be shown ads related displayed in the
to their Web browsing when they return to Facebook. users’ News Feed.
Table 7.2 summarizes the major tools used by marketers to build their brands on Mobile ads can Facebook. include many of the TABLE 7.3
SELECTED FACEBOOK MARKETING CAMPAIGNS C O M PA N Y
M A R K E T I N G C A M PA I G N Target Stores
Promotes discounts across Facebook, Twitter, and mobile platforms
providing access to the Cartwheel.Target.com Web site. Domino’s Pizza
Uses ads to offer discounts to drive sales. Expedia
Uses its fan base to enlist friends’ help to win a free vacation package using a variety of ad types.
Jackson Hewitt Tax preparation service anchored in Walmart stores used Facebook to
increase engagement with its brand by placing ads promoting a dancing game. Winners were
given a $25 gift certificate to use at Walmart.
Starting a Facebook Marketing Campaign
Prior to starting a Facebook marketing campaign, there are some basic strategy questions you
need to address. While every product presumably could benefit from a social marketing
campaign, how is this true of your products? Who is your audience? How can you reach them?
How have real-world social networks been used in the past to support sales in your industry?
Can you be a “thought leader?” Once you have identified your audience, what content will get
them excited and interested? Where are you going to get the content? What will it cost and
what impact do you expect it to have on your brand and sales? At this point you do not need
a detailed budget, but you should be able to develop estimates of the cost of such a campaign,
as well as anticipated revenues.
If you’re new to Facebook marketing, start simple and build on your fan base based on
experience. A typical marketing campaign for Facebook might include the following elements:
• Establish a Facebook page for your brand. Content is king: have interesting, original content that visitors can
be enthusiastic about. Acquire fans.
• Use comment and feedback tools to develop fan comments. You want visitors to engage with your content.
You can also encourage bloggers to develop content for your page. lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 436
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• Develop a community of users. Try to encourage fans to talk with one another, and develop new (free) content for your page.
• Encourage brand involvement through videos and rich media showing products being used by real customers.
• Use contests and competitions to deepen fan involvement.
• Develop display ads for use on Facebook.
• Develop display ads for use in response to social search queries.
• Liberally display the Like button so fans share the experience with their friends.
For more information on social marketing using Facebook, see Learning Track 7.1. Table 7.3
provides some examples of Facebook marketing campaigns.
Measuring Facebook Marketing Results
There are many ways to measure the success of a Facebook marketing campaign, some very
sophisticated. This is a very new field that changes daily. Making matters more complicated is
that industry sources sometimes use different names to refer to the same thing! Where this
occurs we try to give both the most reasonable name and alternative names you might find in trade literature.
Table 7.4 describes some of the basic metrics to use when evaluating a social marketing
campaign. It uses the five steps of the social marketing process found in Figure 7.4—fan
acquisition, engagement, amplification, community, and ultimately brand strengthening and
sales—as an organizing schema.
While the ultimate goal of Facebook marketing is to drive sales (which typically will take
place on your Web site), it is very important to understand what the elements of social
marketing that produce these sales are, and how they can be improved. TABLE 7.4
MEASURING FACEBOOK MARKETING
S O C I A L M A R K E T I N G P R O C E S S M E A S U R E M E N T Fan acquisition (impressions)
The number of people exposed to your Facebook
brand page posts and paid ads (impressions).
The percentage of those exposed who
become fans based on Likes or comments.
The ratio of impressions to fans.
Engagement (conversation rate)
The number of posts, comments, and responses.
The number of views of brand page content.
The number of Likes generated per visitor.
The number of users who responded to games,
contests, and coupons (participation).
The number of minutes on average that visitors stay on your page (duration).
The rate of Likes per post or other content (applause rate). Amplification (reach)
The percentage of Likes, shares, or posts to other
sites (the rate at which fans share your content). lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 437 Community
The monthly interaction rate with your content
(i.e., the monthly total of posts, comments, and
actions on your Facebook brand page).
The average monthly on-site minutes for all fans.
The ratio of positive to negative comments. Brand Strength/Sales
The percentage (or revenue) of your online sales
that is generated by Facebook links compared to
other platforms, such as e-mail, search engines, and display ads.
The percentage of Facebook-sourced
customer purchases compared to other
sources of customers (conversion ratio).
The conversion ratio for friends of fans.
At the most elementary level, the number of fans (or followers) generated is the beginning
of all social marketing. Visitors become fans when they like your content. In the early days of
social marketing, firms put a great deal of emphasis on the size of the fan base, and collecting
Likes. This is less important today, as social marketing managers have become more
sophisticated. Fan engagement in your content and brand is the first step toward developing a
truly social experience, and arguably is more important than simply the number of impressions
or the number of fans. Fans that you never hear from are not valuable. Engagement relates to
how your fans are interacting with your content, how intensely, and how often. Understanding
the kinds of content (videos, text, photos, or posts from fans) that create the highest levels of
engagement is also very important (Unmetric, 2015).
The ability to amplify your marketing message by tapping into the social network of your
fans is also at the core of social marketing. This can be measured very simply as the rate at
which fans recommend your content to their friends, and how many of their friends further
recommend your content to their friends.
Measuring the strength of a Facebook community is not that much different from
measuring the strength of an offline community. In both cases you attempt to measure the
collective activities of all in the community. Among your fans, how many actively participate?
What is the total number of actions taken by fans in a month? How many minutes of
involvement are generated each month? What is the percentage of favorable comments?
Finally, measuring sales that result from social campaigns is also straightforward. First,
measure the percentage of sales you receive from the Facebook channel. You can easily
measure the number of visits to your Web site that originate on Facebook, and the sales these
visits generate. In addition, you can compare purchase rates (conversion rate) for fans and
compare these to conversion rates for non-fans from Facebook. More important, you can
compare the Facebook conversion rate to other visitors who come from different marketing
channels, such as e-mail, display ads, and blogs.
Facebook marketing has entered its second generation even though it’s only four years
old. The emphasis today in social marketing has gone beyond collecting Likes and more toward
building engagement with high-quality content that fans want to share with their friends;
nurturing stable communities of intensely involved fans and friends of fans; and ultimately
turning these communities of fans into communities of purchasers. lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 438
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The experience of marketers is tantalizing but still unclear. E-mail, search, and affiliate
marketing still drive more sales than Facebook or any social marketing today (eMarketer, 2015;
Smith, 2014). Conversion rates for social marketing are less than 1%, while search produces
2.2% and e-mail nearly 4%. Display ads on general Web sites are about as effective for
producing sales as those on social network sites. Facebook ads are much less likely to be clicked
on than display ads on the Web, and sell for less than half the price of Web display ads.
Facebook users join social networks to be social, not to buy or even shop. Despite these
limitations, in the space of a few years, Facebook has been able to create a multi-billion dollar
business selling ads. Rather than replace other ad venues, Facebook may be creating a whole
new venue that it dominates and that has unique value, but nevertheless does not diminish
the role of e-mail or search in the marketing mix.
There are a variety of Facebook analytics tools that provide valuable information about
your Facebook marketing efforts. Facebook Page Insights, provided by Facebook, tracks total
Page Likes, People Talking About This (PTAT) (which tracks the number of unique people who
have clicked on, Liked, commented on, or shared a post), Page Tags and Mentions, Page
Checkins, and other interactions on a page. It also tracks something it calls Engagement Rate.
People are considered to have engaged with a post if they Like it, comment on it, share it, or
click it (Simply Measured, 2015; AdRoll, 2015).
Social media management system HootSuite enables teams to execute marketing
campaigns across multiple networks from one dashboard, and also provides custom reports.
Major analytics providers, such as Google Analytics, Webtrends, and IBM Digital Analytics, also
provide Facebook reporting modules. Read the Insight on Technology case study Optimizing
Social Marketing with Simply Measured for a further look at how one organization is using
analytics tools to help them better understand social marketing. TWITTER MARKETING
Twitter is a micro-blogging social network site that allows users to send and receive 140-
character messages, as well as news articles, photos, and videos. Twitter has an estimated 315
million active users worldwide as of September 2015, and its 2014 revenue was $1.4 billion,
more than double its 2013 revenue. But Twitter lost $577 million in 2014, and has never been
profitable since its founding in 2006. Investors have pummeled its stock down 30% in 2015.
Over 90% of Twitter’s users access the service on mobile devices. Almost all of Twitter’s
revenue comes from pop-ads that appear in users’ timelines (tweet stream), but Twitter also
has many other marketing tools in its quiver. The real magic of Twitter, like Facebook, is that
Twitter does not pay for the 500 million tweets sent each day. They are supplied for free by
active users. Twitter sells ads based on the content of these user messages. Some analysts
believe Twitter could easily become the next Google. See the opening case in Chapter 2 for more information on Twitter.
Twitter was designed from the start as a real-time text messaging service. Twitter offers
advertisers and marketers a chance to interact and engage with their customers in real time
and in a fairly intimate, one-on-one manner. Advertisers can buy ads that look like organic
tweets (the kind you receive from friends), and these ads can tie into and enhance marketing
events like new product announcements or pricing changes. Twitter is announcing new
marketing tools every quarter in an effort to boost its revenues. On the other hand, there may
be a limit to how many ads Twitter users will tolerate. lOMoAR cPSD| 58797173 S o c i a l M a r k e t i n g 439 Basic Twitter Features
While most people probably know what a tweet is, Twitter offers marketers many other ways
of communicating using Twitter. In fact, Twitter has introduced a whole new vocabulary that
is specific to Twitter’s platform. Table 7.5 on page 441 describes the most common Twitter features.
Twitter Marketing Tools
There are many kinds of Twitter marketing products, and the firm is creating new ones every
few months. The current major Twitter marketing tools include the following. INSIGHT ON TECHNOLOGY
OPTIMIZING SOCIAL MARKETING WITH SIMPLY MEASURED
channel may not have the tools to understand
what techniques are working and which need
refinement. That’s where Simply Measured comes
Companies of all shapes and sizes are in.
beginning to tap into the power of social media for
marketing and advertising to improve their
Simply Measured offers analytics tools for all
bottom line and enrich their relationships with major platforms, including Twitter, Facebook,
their customers. As social media continues to Instagram, Tumblr, LinkedIn, YouTube, and
become entrenched in the business and cultural Vine. It also offers variations of those products for
landscape, an ecosystem of companies has sprung individual market segments, such as retail, finance
up around it to meet growing demand. One major and insurance, consumer packaged goods, sports,
area of growth is in social media analytics – tools restaurants, publishing, travel, tech, and
that allow companies to track and report social telecommunications. Simply Measured’s solutions
media account performance and generate allow companies to plan their social strategy,
recommendations on how to optimize social media execute it, and then find out what’s working best.
marketing efforts. Simply Measured is a market Optimizing social marketing techniques in this
leader in this burgeoning field, rating highest in way leads to better audience engagement and
overall customer satisfaction as well as market better bottom-line results. Simply Measured share.
generates reports both in Microsoft Excel and on
Founded in 2010, Simply Measured is based the Web in clear, easily understood formats that
in Seattle, Washington, and has quickly grown can be shared across organizations.
from humble beginnings (the founders built the
Examples of typical basic reports include
original product over a single weekend) to a Facebook Competitive Analysis, which measures
market-leading company capable of raising almost a Facebook page against other competitors in
$30 million in venture capital. It currently has 150 usage and engagement; Traffic Source Analysis,
employees and more than 1,000 customers. Its which determines what sources direct the most
rapid growth is due in part to the similarly rapid traffic to your site; and Twitter Follower
growth in social media platforms during that time, Analysis, which analyzes an account’s followers
as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others have for demographic information and activity trends.
all more than doubled over that span. Marketers Whatever a company’s social marketing needs,
and advertisers eager to tap into this emerging