I’m working in the wrong field.

With all the research and ideas we've been discussing in class, one aspect of digital marketing that really connected with me was branding online. There are so many companies and organisations that use digital marketing to create an on-line presence for their brand. But it’s not just companies that do it is it? This thought came across my mind the other day when I was on YouTube visiting one of my favourite subscribed YouTube partners: Ryan Higa, aka. Nigahiga. For those of you who don’t know who he is, here’s a quick link to a relevant video on Facebook he made:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHYG5u4lwus&feature=player_embedded

His videos are mostly funny parodies, sketch comedies and music videos. Ryan Higa is YouTube's number 1 most subscribed to channel with over 2.6 million subscribers. With such a large audience, Ryan has turned his YouTube channel into a brand in itself. What does this mean? Well to put simply, we all know that if you become partners with YouTube  you can make money from uploading videos. But do you want to know just exactly how much? 

In an article by Megan O’Neil (2010), highlighting the top 10 highest grossing YouTube partners, she cited information from Business Insider who used statistics from an on-line analytic program called TubeMogul. This particular research was used to estimate revenue from banner ads alone. And if you really want to know how these statistics were generated, Megan O’Neil explains: 

“TubeMogul took into account the facts that banner ads have a two-second load delay and that, based on previous research, 2.59% of users click away before the ad has a chance to load, banner ad CPM is $1.50, and YouTube splits all ad revenue with partners, 50-50. Therefore, they got their figures by taking all the partners views from the last year, getting rid of 2.59% of those views, dividing that number by 1,000, multiplying by $1.50 and then dividing that number in half.”

Based on TubeMogul’s estimates Ryan Higa is the fourth highest grossing YouTuber  earning $151,000 a year!!! Keeping in mind that this is an estimate that was only considering earnings from ad banners that appeared at the start of the videos from the channel Nigahiga; Ryan now has multiple channels and features on other fellow YouTubers and is making money from those videos too! In addition many YouTube partners don’t just earn money from ad banners they also make additional money from sponsors, contests, promotional videos, personalised t-shirts and merchandise. 

All Things Facebook.

How many of you have actually taken the time out to have a look around at Facebook’s home screen before logging in, or after logging off? How many of you have actually visited and ‘liked’ the official Facebook fan page? Not many, right?

Why do I say this? Because according to statistics taken directly from Facebook’s newsroom, there are over 955 million monthly active users at the end of July 2012, and 552 million daily active users on average in June 2012; but only 72 million users have ‘liked’ their official fan page; that’s only about 7% of the total population of active monthly users of Facebook who have, I guess you can say, who actually openly expressed that they like Facebook.

So if only 7% of people that use their product have actually expressed their liking for their product, does this make Facebook as a product unsatisfactory in meeting customer needs? Does it make Facebook a bad investment? I would hope that your answers were along the lines of most definitely not!

So the questions I want to put out there is; if ‘likes’ aren't the most accurate representation of how well a business is doing, or how much it is actually liked by consumer; what use is it really? What does a single like mean to businesses in terms of dollars? How do people actually go about justifying the use of Facebook as valuable part of a business? How would you tell your manager that he/she should spend X amount of dollars in using social media, like Facebook  to improve your business? I'm interested in knowing especially if you actually have implemented social media to your place of work, and how it was convinced to your manager as a good source. Was it sheer numbers and statistics of on-line users that did it? Or was more because most people already use Facebook and don’t really think much of having an extra page?

Fun post on Facebook

Also, in relation to my previous post, undoubtedly, I’m going to go ahead and assume that most of you, like myself, who have a Facebook account likely joined simply because everyone around you decided to join. You joined because you wanted to stay connected, stay ‘in with the crowd’, and though you questioned it at first, you probably ended up accepting it quicker than your total alienation of your once vibrant Myspace. None of us did background checks, looked at their fan base, or compared company reports, etc. just to see how they were going, and if they were worth joining. But somehow or another, we all just decided to make the leap into Facebook. And now look at us, without even thinking about it, we use it at home, we use it at work, we use it in school, on our phone; needless to say going by definition, this behaviour can now only be described as an ‘addictive behaviour’ for most of us. The transition from doing things out of habit to an addiction. Just like smoking, drinking, shopping, eating and sex.  

So if you realise that your using Facebook more times in one day than you can count; if you realise you've allocated time out in your everyday to check, like in the morning, at night and in between meals; if you realise that you unconsciously open Facebook on your phone in awkward situations like waiting in a line or café while your friend goes to pee cause you cant stand or sit still for that extra 3 minutes; you are addicted.
But its okay, we’ll get through it; I welcome you with both arms in our first steps to beating our addiction in saying:

"Hello, I’m Jamie, and I'm a Facebook-aholic." - Haha

The need for business to evolve over time.

Since early on, technology has always been a valuable part of business; irreplaceable in fact. No matter where or what business you were in, there was the use of technology somewhere along the way. The use of computers to laptops; moving through to the influence of the Internet; to building a connection; and managing these relationships using a sales forces, and now, to social media.

So how has this new technology that’s being used, help businesses with their business?

Well according to James “Mick” Andzulis, Nikolaos G. Panagopoulos, and Adam Rapp (2012), who have written a journal article reviewing social media implications to the selling process, “argue that using current social media applications must be viewed as a living, dynamic process in the firm. It is a strategy that will require substantial commitment and continuous monitoring.” This argument cannot be truer, don’t you think?

When I first came across this article, it was interesting to read that they compared social media to Darwin’s theory of evolution. It is the perfect analogy. Just as Darwin’s theory of evolution was based on random genetic mutations which occur within an organism’s genetic code, keeping all the most beneficial mutations to aid survival (Nelson Bridgeford, 2009); so too has computers, laptops, the Internet, and social media, been the beneficial mutations in which evolved all businesses today; evolving ‘the way we do business’ in order to survive. 

In order to stay competitive, stay relevant, and stay in tune with the connections you have with your customers, constant developments need to be made to a business in order to adapt to the changes that surround them. In other words, to create, deliver and communicate superior customer value. 

Just so as the Internet was estranged to businesses once, so too is social media now. But the gradual acceptance of each of these has proven to be invaluable adaptations made in business in order to keep up, and survive. We see this everywhere; take a look at Olympians. Every year they come back with a better pair of running shoes, a firmer grip or better racquet's, to the specific materials used in making swimsuits to allow swimmers swim faster. 

Domino’s Pizza made the jump to social media. They used to be solely reliant of traditional methods of marketing through newspaper and advertisements in magazines and TV. But now in recent years they started using social media and incorporating it into their marketing strategy through the use of Facebook. It opened up an entirely new revenue for feedback that Domino's never had previously. It let them inform their customers of upcoming special deals and tried to get feedback of new toppings for upcoming pizzas for instance.

Allowing the incorporation of social media is to design and deliver something different, something unique, something that gives them the chance to differentiate themselves from their competitors; to stay ahead, stay competitive, and survive. 

Evolution in business.