Comments on: Social Media is not Mass Media

By: The definitive list of what social media is not « Emerson Direct Marketing Observations

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:57:13 +0000

[...] Young from GigaOm, mentioned 2 years [...]

By: Leveraging Ideas » Social Architecture: Sam Huleatt - Social Media, Venture Capital and Startup Architecture Blog

Thu, 01 Nov 2007 03:41:41 +0000

[...] architecture is a sub segment within the growing field of technology, specifically social media. Social media itself spans many genres; from marketing (SMM) to optimization (SMO), to design to PR to communications to [...]

By: Ian Kennedy

Ian Kennedy — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 08:34:12 +0000

Inspirational post. As you say, it’s still a wide open opportunity - I think whoever figures out how to wrap convincing metrics around the impact of their social media advertising format is going to reap the lion’s share of the mass media ad budgets moving online. Other formats will see a pop for their novelty but only those that can consistently show return are going to be left standing.

By: Robert Young

Robert Young — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:17:35 +0000

Thanks for the great comments (as usual). As I began the piece, much of what I stated should be pretty obvious and fairly well understood. But having lived through several major inflection points of the Internet, I just wanted to reassert that we are indeed in another one now. And what this means is that there is a very high liklihood that some new revolutionary models will emerge, giving new players the opportunity to exploit the Achilles heel of incumbent players.

By: Sivaraman Swaminathan

Sivaraman Swaminathan — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 02:59:57 +0000

Rob

Great post.

I think the future ad models have to get customers to buy-in rather than make them buy! It has to build a dialogue rather than inform! It's not about cost per click(CPC) but cost per conversation(CPC)

By: Steve M.

Steve M. — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 01:08:38 +0000

As always; great insight, Robert…new paradigm MEM/paid match (patent app #11/250,908) would likely fit the bill nicely…

Target people. Not words.

Pay-per-click that makes sense…social media included…

By: Jerry M.

Jerry M. — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 20:17:59 +0000

I think the innovation is happening already — I just read about Lotame — (link) — which seems to have some hardcore ad tech people behind it.

By: Deborah Schultz

Deborah Schultz — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 17:11:28 +0000

Banner ads and PV - I wish they would just die already…

So, the new IAB numbers are out and Om and Jason are debating the future of banner ads. I say - die banner ad die.They are a lousy extension of 'spray and pray' ad models from TV and Print. Granted…

By: tomo

tomo — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 17:08:37 +0000

Great article and comments. One thing I think is important to consider because it really adds some perspective to the macro view is that the line of deliniation between personal/private/social/community are becoming blurred or nonexistant from an advertising perspective by virtue of the medium. Advertisers ability to target consumers is now almost infinite whereas in the past was totally dependent upon irregular market obstacles like when a certain program would air on television would be when the most efficient time to target that demographic is whereas now that demographic can be targeted while they are at work, home, remote via pda or phone, etc. The opportunity for an advertiser to hit that specific demographic went from maybe 15 mins a week(guessing how much advertising is available in a 60 minute program) to 24 hours a day. That certainly changes the advertising landscape in the sense that with so much ability to deliver advertising you in essence have more supply and greater customization ability in msging that will, in theory, drive more utility in the future dollars spent by advertisers compared with todays environment. This isn’t new though and has been occuring in the space since its inception but it is interesting to think how much further is it going to go/evolve.

By: Kim Ramage

Kim Ramage — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 16:47:07 +0000

Robert, great post!

I would love to hear you and your readers thoughts on how the DMCA and copyright issues will affect or restrict advertising models for user-generated content.

Grand Egress commented above that today’s 2.0 social media companies are struggling because they can't support ad models due to the natue of the content. Grand is correct.

How do you create an advertising model for user-generated content and not run into issues with the DMCA?

By: Frank Bishop

Frank Bishop — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 16:01:21 +0000

Robert, you are right on!

The shift from "mass" (one to many) to "social" (many to many) is absolutely fundamental to the transformation shaking up the media world. Google has demonstrated that harnessing user-generated content (ie, blogs and web sites) as advertising inventory can be unbelievably profitable.

A lot of people (myself included) believe the next evolutionary step in online advertising will be harnessing user-generated content syndication. As content moves from a single-point, destination web site to a distributed network spread among millions of web sites (ie, "to the edge"), advertising models will need to adopt. Two companies that immediately come to mind who are positioning themselves for this shift are Feedburner (ads inserted into RSS feeds) and SplashCast (rich media syndication where the line between content and advertisement becomes blurred).

By: alan patrick

alan patrick — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 15:50:39 +0000

Social media has been around since Babylonian times, at least :). There is a great book called the Victorian Internet to read of one ever falls into the trap of thinking this is all new!

The point re Web 1.0 approaches is thus well made, but what is different now is the order of magnitude jump in 'Net penetration and the order of magnitude(s) drop in transaction costs since 2001.

Not to mention that its simple-to-useness (can I patent that term?) is much higher, so people use it a lot more.

By: Grand Egress

Grand Egress — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 15:35:58 +0000

It's always safe (and, so, tedious) to predict that, gee, things will be way different than now in ten years.

OK fine.

But its worth noting that while social emdia has got everybody buzzing these days… social media has had everybody buzzing since literally day one of the Internet. Does no one remember GeoCities, Tripod, et. al.? Does no one pause to consider that those 1.0 social media companies were the Next Big Thing but then fizzled (as businesses, not as investments) because in fact they couldnt support ad models (due to the natue of the content)? And that today's 2.0 social media companies are struggling exactly the same way?

Plus ca change?

By: Dave Coleman

Dave Coleman — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 15:35:56 +0000

Rob

You literally just hit the nail on the head, I could not agree more. Everyone at this point is pushing into the same old advertising model. In fact thats a general trend on the internet. Someone does something successful and then every man, woman and his dog join in. What is going to be interesting is to see these new innovative methodologies of advertising that leverage the interactive nature of social media. I said it in Om’s last post about ad’s but watch out for netus because we are definitely trying to embrace change. It may be a risk, but as you have clearly pointed out in your article, its a necessary risk. Fantastic post!

By: George

George — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 12:56:24 +0000

I could not agree more - what we are witnessing today is simply the tip of the iceberg of online advertising and not its entirety (as some pundits would have us believe). It will be interesting to see whether Adsense, for example, retains its popularity as a provider of online advertising solutions 10 years down the line.

By: alan patrick

alan patrick — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 10:05:09 +0000

One last thing…I also think there is a place for AntiSocial Media