Native ads are the hottest frontier in online marketing today. These ads are unique to a particular site or platform, and are meant to blend inconspicuously into the site’s design. The result is that the content-driven ad looks more like part of the site than an advertisement, creating an experience for a consumer that is seamless, clean and unobtrusive. Classic examples include Google AdWords and YouTube's TrueView Video Ads. However, native advertising isn’t new, or limited to online – infomercials and live read ads on radio by a DJ or news anchor are also great examples of native formats. The most recent surge of native advertising is brought to you by social media. With the rise of social networks and the focus of online marketing shifting to engagement and interactivity, brands are anxious to be part of the content with native placements like Twitter’s Promoted Tweets and Facebook’s Page Post Ads.
This can present a bit of a double-edge sword: while native ads reportedly deliver higher engagement rates than many other types of ads, consumers may view them as deceptive since they look so much like publisher content. A recent study by MediaBrix showed that many consumers find sponsored video that... Read more
Archive for Molly Glover Gallatin 
Proceed with Caution: Three Data Points That Can Make or Break Your Facebook Strategy
Facebook has seen a lot of changes in the last several months, and is becoming more brand-friendly every day. As opportunities for growing an engaged fan base improve, many marketers are jumping in feet-first, creating pages and posting away reactively.
But the key to achieving a true Facebook win lies in focusing on what drove you to the social network in the first place: Your audience.
As you begin to execute on your 2013 marketing plans (which will certainly include Facebook), keep in mind these critical user stats brands must consider to achieve Facebook success.
Unlikes by Number of Brand Posts
We studied a random selection of 80 Facebook brand pages and uncovered an interesting trend: The number of daily Fan “unlikes” increases with a brand’s number of posts each day. In other words, the more times a brand posts, the greater the risk losing fans! In fact, we found that unlikes for these brands increased by 15 percent when going from one to two posts and by another 13 percent once posting jumps to three or more times per day.
The lesson here is to post relevant, useful content and not to inundate your audience with self-serving marketing posts or benign conversation starters.... Read more
The Calm in the Eye of the Social Media Storm
The more the social media landscape shows itself to be an unpredictable and even unruly place, the more brands need to focus on content. Amongst the onslaught of tweets, check-ins, mentions, shares and more, the right content will drive desired brand messaging outcomes and the kind of intelligence that is essential to compete in the multichannel marketplace.
Now, before embarking on a haphazard posting spree, know that over-posting will do more harm than good. Compass Labs’ research has shown that “unlikes” dramatically increase when brands post too often. In fact, we noticed that the more brands post each day, the more fans they lose. However, this is less about the number of posts and more about the quality of the posts.
Quality content is key, but quality can be subjective; really, it’s defined by relevance to your audience. The best way to ensure your content is relevant is to listen to your audience so you can learn what resonates with them. Take the time to understand your biggest fans: are they sarcastic comedians, business professionals, animal lovers, baseball fans, or yogis? Leverage social networks as the goldmine of self-expression that they are, and let your audiences’ expressions shape your own. Depending on... Read more
