Good advice on the Two-Street that is Marketing on the Social Web

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advertising on the social web today

social media encompass older Internet offerings, such as e-mail discussion lists, Usenet newsgroups, Web communities and product review sites, as well as newer offerings, such as blogs, wikis and podcasts.

The key difference between Internet advertising media and traditional advertising media is that the latter are interruptive––advertisers interrupt your message to bring you theirs––while the former are participative––advertisers can join in with your marketing efforts. Evans recommends choosing advertising in which others can participate.

“You need to get the support of vocal user communities,” Evans says. “Through those, individuals can credibly spread the word about your products or services.” In the Internet age, “to truly persuade, you must engage,” he says.

You can't engage people within a social network without disturbing the network itself, Evans acknowledges. In doing that, you could wind up coming across as manipulative––if you're not careful.

The classic case of a new media marketing backfiring involved Sony Ericsson. When it launched a new camera/cell phone in 2002, the company hired actors to pretend they were foreign tourists in New York City. To help spread the word about the new gadgets, the actors, fake accents and all, asked New Yorkers to take a picture of them with the device. Once the truth surfaced, people were indignant. The backlash became larger than campaign itself, and the brand took a knock.

Though the Internet didn't play a direct role here, it does make it easy for individuals and companies alike to mask their identity. Avoid the temptation. Given the connected nature of consumers today, it’s just a matter of time before any disguised marketing effort will be widely exposed.

“Be 110 percent transparent,” Evans recommends. “Tell people who you are, what you're selling, and why you're trying to sell it to them.”

The classic way to market products or services through participative technologies is to establish yourself as an expert and provide objective content that has value beyond your specific products or services. To sell via the Internet, you first must be useful. The more useful you are, the more you'll persuade people to visit your Web site and check into your products or services.

It's all about transparency and, in many ways, back to the days of door-to-door salesmanship and client visits... except this time with an AJAX browser.


Technorati Tags: web 2.0 marketing, transparency, Sony Ericsson

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