Describe the value of sales

The most important first day of the holiday shopping season was black Friday, the researchers found. Only 0.68% of all online buying deals come directly from Facebook, and the number of transactions from Twitter is almost nil.

The New York Times recently published an article signed by Stephen Beck (Stephen Baker), saying that with the rise of social networks, more and more users will be involved, even the pope has opened a Twitter account. Advertisers will naturally not miss the advantage of this platform, they build a search engine, using the "algorithm" of this weapon to find business opportunities. For advertisers, social platforms are "an indispensable future". But because of the lack of measurement standards and quantitative information, social networking marketing may give you the "ultimate lesson".

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One morning in mid-December last year, the current Pope Benedict 16 (Pope Benedict XVI) posted his first microblog on Twitter with the ipad. From a marketing point of view, this is a matter of time. While the pope is publishing his traditional papal Oracle online, other world leaders are also using Facebook and Twitter to expand their influence through social media. So how can the Vatican resist such a magical market effect?

Now, marketing consultancies have sprung up, and these companies have touted social media as an "indispensable future". They argue that if marketing information comes from users ' friends on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or google++, these campaigns will be more likely to "hit a home run". This is the new Word-of-mouth marketing model, the golden rule of marketing. In addition, the unlimited data contained in these networks can help with the prospect of accurate positioning of ads. This vision of change has sparked a frenzy of social networking that has dragged the social network back.

Everything revolves around the data. "Mad Man" (Mad Men) is a TV show depicting the 60 's Madison Avenue advertising company, the protagonist, Draper, a creative director of an advertising company, poured some whiskey into his desk and sat down on the couch in the office corner, thinking, His job is to predict people's needs and desires and then give them answers through various ideas. What kind of slogan would make a tough airline executive feel like one? Draper's Small world was dominated by humanists, while the quantitative analysts were sitting in shady offices, Reading Nielsen's report and audience composition.

Over the past decade, however, these figures have quickly climbed to the top of the pyramid. They build and run search engines and expand their influence in various areas. Now that social networks have risen, they have integrated all sorts of gossip from around the world into their own servers, allowing these quantitative analysts to climb higher. Their most powerful "weapon" is not an idea, but an algorithm. Many of the advertising draper now retire early, while others seek new jobs through social networks like LinkedIn.

But for the humanists, they have seen new hopes this year, or at least made them feel schadenfreude. Last May, when Facebook was listed, the company's value was valued at $104 billion trillion, and the company's share price fell since the first day of the company's debut, prompting many to question the potential of social networking as a paid advertising medium. Only 14% of corporate advertisers ' online budgets are given to social networks. From last year, the E-commerce market expanded 16% to 39 billion dollars in the holiday shopping season, according to the market research firm comscore. But social-networking ads seem to have been a complementary part of this. IBM researchers found that of the most important first day of the 2012-year holiday shopping season, Black Friday, only 0.68% of all online purchases came directly from Facebook, and the number of transactions from Twitter was almost nil. Is it possible to say that when people meet their friends online, there is no propensity to buy?

It may be possible to answer this: when new phenomena surface, it is difficult to know what is valuable. This has happened before. In the dotcom bubble of the late 90, investors invested billions of of billions of dollars in internet start-ups, which had pledged to offer targeted ads to hundreds of millions of of users or web visitors. But the visitors did not bring profits to the business, and the ambitious Internet market collapsed. Many sceptics are delighted that the Internet has failed.

While these online sceptics cheered, a service company called Overture Services pioneered innovative advertising applications for the new media. It turns out that when netizens search, they don't resent searching for content-related ads. If they click on one of the ads, The Advertiser will pay the search engine a corresponding fee.

Google (Weibo) quickly and massively use this pay advertising system, successfully turned the link click into a real profit. Through this system, advertisers can calculate the return on their investment per penny. In this field, the "Mad Men" view is worthless.

The rise of search has not only hit the humanists, but has set a trap for quantitative analysts to sink in. The advent of search has convinced people that all advertising can be translated into quantitative science as long as there is enough data. This idea was eventually discarded by the advertising equation. For generations, the Mad Men of advertising have always believed that their rhyming words and slogans can change consumer behavior. Thankfully, there is no data to prove that the idea is wrong. But if it is in an industry running on cold numbers, a similar expectation is undoubtedly imprudent. Advertising companies are under great pressure to provide statistics to prove their success. When they replace numbers by providing anecdotes, the market punishes them. Faith has become a suspicion.

This has also led to anger among advertisers, as it is hard to compute value in a server market that is full of social data. What is the value of Facebook's "praise" and Twitter followers? So marketing becomes another hot spot for data search, including brain science and genetics. The scientists combed thousands of trillion of data to try to find out whether specific genes or groups of cells could trigger a relative reaction to the association. The results are unclear, however, because the brain and genes are very complex systems with countless variables, like social networks. Even though researchers are shuttling back and forth from the data left by their predecessors, they are still trying to find the key answer to the causal problem. What kind of action should I take to get the response I want?

The number of analysts blamed each other for the wrong number. In the case of IBM's Black Friday survey, although its survey figures point to few shoppers who buy laptops or refrigerators directly through social networks, some of them buy the product, perhaps because they have previously seen advertisements on social networks. If so, the valuable influence of social-networking advertising is incalculable. "IBM has only analyzed a single point of time," said Dan Neely, a marketing analyst networked Insights CEO Dan Niri. "Networked insights the black Friday activity at Macy's department store on Twitter, Niri said the campaign was a viral wave on the internet. It is clear that many of the major advertisers are still believers in social network advertising. Last week, it was reported that Wal-Mart, Samsung and other large companies have recently boosted their investment in social media advertising, and Facebook's share price has been bolstered.

However, it is still a challenge to measure the effectiveness of social media advertising. "Influence is hard to measure," said Steve Canepa, general manager of IBM's media and entertainment department, Steve Canepa. ”

In fact, this may be the ultimate lesson from the so-called "social media marketing myth". The impact of new technology is always underestimated, because people use the past to measure the future.

Dave Morgan, the pioneer of internet advertising and Simulmedia founder of television advertising network, spoke of the early days of the Power age. Dave Morgan At the end of 19th century, most people linked new industries to the precious services of lighting. This is the market understanding. Electricity will replace kerosene and candles, becoming a huge lighting device. What people do not realize is that, in addition to lighting, electricity will be a breeding platform for a series of new industries. In the years that followed, entrepreneurs made vacuum cleaners and washing machines, even radio and television. Giant industries grow in power platforms. In this regard, you can think of Apple, which is worth 496 billion of dollars in the company is relying on the latest generation of power applications products.

Whether you like it or not, social networking does quickly build a new network of relationships. While the human matrix of social media may have sparked controversy in advertising and marketing, its potential in consulting, education, collaborative design, market search, media and products and services has been incalculable. And perhaps the future of social networking may extend its reach to every aspect of people's lives, and even soap can be sold.