The first study Social Media Marketing vs. Prevalent Marketing Practices: A Study of Marketing Approaches for Micro firms in Sweden (.pdf download) focuses on micro firms leveraging social media to promote higher customer loyalty. The author sought to answer the following questions:

1. Which of the two types of marketing is more effective in terms of targeted segment coverage and expenditures?
2. Which marketing approach enables micro firms to maintain better relationships with customers?
3. Whether or not it is the right time for micro firms in Sweden to adopt social media marketing practices?

The heart of the study is Section 4.2.3.

The second study, Structured Viral Communication: The Political Economy and Social Organization of Digital Disintermediation (.pdf), is the best analysis I’ve read of how Obama used structured communication plans to spread his message and increase loyalty.

Photo credit ssoosay

The research team, using prior research in SRCT theories, tested whether humans could discern whether a text message was sent via a human or computer when flattery was an element of the message. They found that humans reliably discern the originator of the message apparently because certain social cues were missing in the computer-generated messages.

Why this is relevant research: SRCT theories could be used by software designers to create computer programs to engage social network users with the goal of getting them to increase self-disclosure under the guise of an interaction seemingly being conducted with a human. With the FTC recently considering allowing people to opt-out of behavioral targeting on the Web, the issue of nudging people towards more self-disclosure is timely given all the issues surrounding privacy and use of PII in social networks, especially if a user discloses such PII under the assumption they’re interacting with a human. This is a very interesting article and quick read (four pages).

This study focuses on how to find similarities amongst individuals using social media based on their behavioral characteristics. Finding such similarities across myriad social networks has beneficial uses: making users aware of other users with similar interests, finding users who comment on the same blogs, and enhancing already existing recommender systems (e.g., Pandora’s partnership with Facebook). Would be interesting to see a real estate application using these theories.

• Facebook marketing “partners” (e.g., shopping sites, news sites, etc) have seen huge jumps in referral traffic after implementing Facebook’s “social plug-ins”
• Despite the success Facebook marketing partners may experience, security issues have emerged with the implementation of these social plug-ins
• Facebook’s brand image is rising with adults 18-34 but dropping with adults 35+

Brands appear to benefit by tightly integrating Facebook into their customer outreach efforts. For example, this MediaWeek article (thanks @ReggieRPR for the heads-up) reports that Starbuck’s Facebook page is valued at $20 million. Nevertheless, the CNET article points out interesting issues that could impact Facebook’s marketer outreach efforts. The core of the issue is the inherent tension between publicity vs privacy; that is, just because someone makes something public does not mean they necessarily want it publicized. Danah Boyd in her keynote address at the 2010 SXSW Interactive made this latter point, as well as the following observations:

• Technologists’ have a mantra that “privacy is dead”, but this is not true
• People still care about privacy and the “public by default” “private through effort” dichotomy represents an inherent tension for individuals wanting to navigate online social worlds (Danah was referencing the fact that in many social networks users’ personally identifiable information and activities conducted through these social networks are rendered “public” by default and that users have to proactively change their privacy settings to make such information and activities less public or wholly private)
• Marketers should remember that just because you can “see” someone does not mean they want to be “seen” by you
• A Pew study showed that most adult social network users are privacy conscious (see related Pew study here showing that younger adults seem to be exerting even more control over their digital reputations)
• Product developers need to think through publicity-vs-privacy-vs-control issues if they want to develop and launch successful products that tap the inherent benefits of the online social world

It will be interesting to see whether consumers will or will not readily use Facebook’s social plug-ins as privacy issues continue to gain mainstream media attention. What are your views?

Photo: alancleaver_2000

Excellent discussion on measurment tactics for Google AdWords campaigns. Discusses basics of setting up a custom report in Google Analytics to tips on interpreting data.

This research paper (pdf link) explores the “viral effect” in Flickr (used as a model of social networks in general) and found that the viral effect generally stays within close proximity of the original uploaders, social links are the dominant method to share and spread a message, and popularity of pictures grows over years. The paper is not a “gentle” read, but worth your time if you want to dig in deep on data analytical methodology.