We Are Social's Monday Mashup #62
Social media spending to reach 9.8% of overall marketing budgets this year
A survey from the American Marketing Association has found that social media spending will rise to 9.8% of overall marketing spend over the next twelve months – looks like CMOs are starting to share our outlook on the world.
Online video sharing doubled in the last 9 months
A recent study reported by Econsultancy found that video sharing has increased by more than 86% since May 2010, with Facebook leading the charge peaking at 62.5m shares in December, Twitter levelling out at around 640k, and blog video sharing dropping by half from 460k to 243k. To put that into perspective, that’s 91 shares per single share on Twitter, and 260 for every share on a blog – phenomenal proof of how far video sharing has progressed in social media and, in particular, the success of Facebook’s video integration.
Facebook reaches majority of US web users, Twitter reach much lower
eMarketer have released data claiming that over half of US internet users (including users on mobile devices) logged into Facebook at least once a month in 2010, with a forecasted rise to 57% this year. However, it’s dramatic growth rates are at an end, with projected rises in single figures for 2012 and beyond, and market saturation beginning to take hold – it’s predicted that 92.6% of US social network users will be on Facebook by 2013. Twitter fared much better with 2011 growth projected at 26.3% but its use in the US is still underwhelming – only 9% of US users engaged with the site in 2010, lower than previously forecasted. However, it’s not all bad news – a predicted 28 million Americans will be tweeting by 2013.
Facebook claims 3m active UK users of Places
In some interesting stats relayed to Robin Wilson, Facebook are claiming that 3 million of their 26 million UK users are using Facebook places – a much higher total than expected and a measure of it’s success so far.
New ASA guidelines on digital marketing come into force in the UK
From tomorrow, the Advertising Standards Authority will extend its remit to communication on brands own websites and sites under their control, including social media. Since 2008 they’ve received 4,500 complaints about non-paid for marketing online, and they felt they had to act. If you want to know our take on this, read Robin’s in-depth analysis.
Facebook upgrades the Like button
By hitting ‘like’ users will now be posting a full story with a headline, blurb and thumbnail to their wall – matching the reach of the previously favoured Share. Facebook like it so much they have stopped developing the Share button and intend to use the Like button as the “recommended solution moving forward” creating a stronger user experience, and in turn raising user expectations. It’s expected to increase traffic to publishers’ websites and will make Like demonstrably more visible to users who were previously unaware of what ‘liking’ a product actually meant – it will be interesting to see whether users think twice about hitting it after the change takes affect.
Facebook Pages increase tab visibility
In other Facebook news, Page admins can now re-order tabs.
EasyJet launches blog
The low cost airline is taking to blogging to boost its online presence, after success with its 150-hour “blogger challenge”. It’s a positive move for the airline and there will be more to come as they promise to “integrate everything we do online with the wider business”. Whether this means you’ll pay extra to comment remains to be seen…
We’re working with BrandAlley
NMA reported our relationship with BrandAlley this week, with activity kicking off with content created around London Fashion Week.
Check-in at Mardis Gras with Southern Comfort
Foursquare users are being directed to an enormous billboard at Mardi Gras this year to check in to enter a Southern Comfort sweepstake and leave tips for other partygoers – a great use of the check-in by a company that would otherwise be without a location. Lets hope tips get posted before ‘interacting’ too much with the brand…
Odeon reward fans checking in on Facebook Places
In the latest impressive use of Facebook Deals we’ve seen, Odeon will give away a small box of popcorn to people checking into their cinemas until the end of March (limited to 1,000). Interestingly, there’s no obligation to actually see a film, although they probably see that as a given.
‘Astroturfing’ on an industrial scale
Social media’s democratising claims are being tested by fake grassroot campaigns run by powerful organisations – the US Air Force was recently found to be tendering for powerful ‘persona management software’ to create false accounts with “powerful deniability”. This is bad, and such tools and tactics would be illegal here in the EU. Let’s see if that stops the US Air Force or not…