Facebook, Privacy, OverHype and Bad Business Model

Facebook has just received a lot of flack (deservedly) for their efforts to expose (by force) more of the content people post to their website for all the worlds eyes to see. This is after the failed Beacon service, and other efforts to boost advertising revenue. As an advertising platform this business is significantly over-hyped by a few biased groups:

1] Facebook Employees and Investors - they want to cash out with an IPO then who cares what happens to the business.

2] Social Media Journalists - They are paid to write about social media and of course Facebook is one of the biggest. If Social Media fails to live up to the hype they might be seeking new jobs.

3] Social Media Guru's/Consultants who claim they can help you make bank using websites such as Facebook. Recently it was proven many ex-real estate folks have migrated to Social Media.

4] People who are employed by their firms to be the Social Media Manager - which can be frustrating but also very fun to work on. And who wants to go back to Accounting?

5] Hyper Hype! Facebook and it's promoters spout now 350 million accounts. Yet in August when they had 300 million there were only 92 million unique visitors per comscore. So why the discrepancy? Well I have 2 accounts. 1 personal and 1 for a service of my company Sky Pulse Media. And companies like USocial sell friends and fans by the 1,000's. So there has to be over 100 million zombie accounts!

So those are the vested interests in businesses like Facebook living up to the Advertising Platform Hype.

Considering Facebook is seeking to exploit it's users (community's) information and content to make money as an Ad Platform it really puts their business on the side of Advertisers and not the community who without they would not exist! Kind of like being on the Yankees and offered a massive contract but trying to earn money from the Red Sox instead.

Now I wish to state I don't hate Facebook. The technology is great. It can be bested since it lacks many, many things in terms of the format. But it was the first really simple platform for people to connect with each other. And this is why I get aggro on them. If Facebook took Apple's model and sold their technology to other businesses, or had a subscription model where Advertiser's be damned, then they would be on the same side as the community. It would allow them to do things in a walled garden that people would be willing to participate in more openly. And immediately they would be valued much higher than they are now.

But currently they use this news feed and live news feed as kind of their platform for brands and marketers to listen and reach the community. But just like with Twitter this stream is monstrous. Every time I log in I have 300+ posts I haven't read, of which I usually read the first 25. So over 275 posts I do not see. And 90% of all accounts that I check out are set to private. This proves people want the walled garden. So their business model is going against what the community will champion and as soon as a true alternative pops up people will fly away. If you think they won't social media is littered with the last great hype...Friendster, Myspace, Tribe, sites people spent considerable time developing profiles, uploading photos only to jump away when something better came.

So when I see this whacked out effort to go behind people in a weaselly manner to have them expose themselves more I am allowed to champion the community over the website. I use weasel because instead of having new settings and allowing people to change them...when the window popped up t automatically changed them and you had to change them back. And if your business is a reflection of your ethics, honor, and character then Mark Zuckerberg fails once again on all 3 counts.

Social Media Listening

Social Media ‘listening’ should be a part of every company’s strategy to get feedback and learn how to improve their products and services. And to offer a quick and easy web presence folks can address you at. And this is all FREE! It also provides easy ways to conduct conversations with your customers in a non-sterile comfortable manner. people are much more likely to let their honesty hang out than if they were in person at a focus group. People inherently don't like offending other people even if it means telling the truth, when the other person is right there in front of them.

BUT Social Media is not a viable advertising platform because people find the networks private, kind of like walking into someone’s home so they don’t want to be intruded on. How you feel walking down the street chatting with your friend and every time you mention a word that relates to a product an Ad gets pumped in your face? That is what Facebook dreams of.

So as much behavioral information a Facebook or Twitter has at their finger tips, people do not wants Ad’s cluttering their conversations, and the high level of clutter makes it really hard for a Brand or Business to even get their information read. Much better channels for advertising than social media as it exists today.

Social Networking and the big lie

I started with Friendster and Tribe.net. Then Myspace was the rage. Now Facebook. And even more current Twitter is the newest in new. With all these services the same thing occurs over time. Clutter Creep. Initially it was great reconnecting with friends on Facebook. Or connecting on Myspace (I am into music). But over time when you finally have enough 'friends' you can not keep up with everyone. My old High School friends? Rarely ever see even a post from them on my front page since the initial 'Hey how have you been exchange'. And while Brands, Musicians, etc think this is a great medium to broadcast updates and news, most gets buried in the clutter. Normally I log in check my email....and just like with standard email I delete 90% of the broadcast updates without opening them. And to reach me me through updating what you are up too....if your not on my front page when I log in...I will never see it. I never check my wall so I never see anyone who is posting to my own updates.

Clutter Clutter Clutter!

And thus is the reason why Advertising is a failure on Social Networks.

In my opinion the true value of a Social Network for a brand is to reach the people outside of the network not inside...but to use the information from inside to help narrow who you send your advertising too.

Think of this scenario. Coke wants to launch a loyalty campaign. So they send a message to all their fans on Facebook. Well as I just mentioned since all the broadcasts to my email are ones I opt in for and each possibly important or of value. The fact is if I have 200 of them to go over 90% get deleted without opening. What about just posting on their fan page? Well I am fans of a lot of things but I also never go to any of those fan pages, or have so many I don't have the time. This is not a dilemma. This just means Social Networks are not a great medium to use (though they are CHEAP!).

As for damage control from attack campaigns. Well is this different than email? Not really. In reality the big worry should be search. Coke does not want someone to Bing 'Coke' and have all these anti-coke blogs pop up first. I personally do not think Social Networks are all that more powerful than TV or Blogs or even a bad write up in Consumer Reports.

The other big deficiency in Facebook is the lack of a true profile page. Their set up is very weak. It is not an information service it is a communication service.

And Brands need to understand they are already inundating us with Advertising everywhere. On TV, Radio, out of your home driving around, in stores, in print etc. So why they feel they have to intrude on every single personal space we have to be successful is because Agency's are snowing them into thinking this is the way. But really it only enriches the Agency's.

When Opt-In Content Becomes Spam...Email, Facebook, Twitter...

Today everyone is bombarded with media spam and clutter in our every day life. Walk or drive and you see billboards and company's advertising on their buildings/storefronts. Advertising is now in gas stations and the supermarkets. Even the men's room of bars have advertising!

Many brands, organizations and businesses use email and social networking with Opt-In programs thinking that these are superior to the traditional methods of Push Advertising. But in reality this is true only in the beginning. Eventually all those Opt-In methods become spam to consumers.

When the volume of Opt-In subscriptions reaches a point where they become clutter then your program loses it's effectiveness.

For example the front page of Facebook and Twitter shows a stream of events in time. Your friends/contacts/followers post information about current happenings that can be viewed by a consumer. But people don't crawl through the whole volume of postings once those postings become hard to follow due to volume. If you have 200 every time you log in then those posts drown each other out.

Same for email. I have a personal account that I have signed up for emails from Brands/Stores, News Providers, Sports Teams, Non-Profits Orgs, Political Groups, and Social/Lifestyle Events as well as friends contacting me. Today of my first 100 I combed through I deleted 93 of them without reading or opening them. Every single one of those 93 were Opt-In by me.

Yet when the CEO asks the CMO to review their marketing channels/programs the CMO will claim me in their tallies for the various Opt-In channels I subscribed too (from Cable TV to email) and the CMO will claim they reached me...yet that would be a lie.

The point of this post isn't to specifically offer a solution as much to be aware that Brands must get creative if they want to ensure they stand out. This goes beyond crafting a message or an image. It goes to the heart of Advertising and why CMO's have such high turnover. Specifically how you prove your value and your budgets value to the CEO! And to be fair sometimes the CMO or Agency is successful in their general mission yet are considered failures by the CEO. Other times the product or service is so good that no matter what the CMO or Agency does, they are a successful and take credit.

It is best to figure out a media plan that will increase the quality vs the quanitity of impressions/contact with the consumer. People will get your message out for you if you do a good job. Media plans should incorporate as much pay for performance as possible that is measurable/trackable.

Everyone looks after their own best interest. Your Agencies and Marketing Departments for years have relied on fuzzy math and logic to ensure you keep spending your ad dollars no matter what happens. Often with little proof of accomplishment. Some branding efforts will never be able to be truly measured.

Some image building programs will be done less with regard to increasing sales as much as supporting the demands of the brand. Think of a Rolex Bill Board or Panel Ad in an Airport. They know most of the people viewing the ads can never afford their watches but they need to present themselves to the common person so that the elite will feel special when they buy a Rolex. So these programs should not end, but brands should break out of their media budget the actual dollars they wish to allocate to actually bringing in sales and figure out how to maximize the return on those invested dollars vs. using the dart board/shot gun/me too-follow what everyone is doing approach.