First World Problems

Thanks Paul de Gregorio

Facebook says impressions, reach and frequency matter more than clicks

Well worth a read if you missed it. Clearly Facebook need to react to all the “my click through rates arent good” stuff, but to be honest I know someone who uses Facebook (major international brand) for quick reach and scale, so this seems to align. Article is from Inside Facebook written by Brittany Darwell

 

Clicks aren’t the right metric for brand advertisers, Facebook Head of Measurement and Insights Brad Smallwood told the audience at the IAB MIXX Conference in New York today.

Smallwood shared results from recent campaign studies that indicated impressions, reach and frequency were more valuable than clicks. Specifically, 99 percent of sales came from users who saw an ad but did not interact with it. Campaigns that optimized for reach were 70 percent more effective at driving ROI, and campaigns that optimized for frequency had a 40 percent increase in ROI.

Smallwood began by outlining the history of advertising and measurement, noting that for the past few years Facebook hasn’t had the right tools and metrics for advertisers to understand their performance on the platform. Now with the company’s partnership with Datalogix, which connects digital media and offline purchasing data, Facebook says it has found a better model that not only proves ROI but also helps advertisers improve their campaigns.

Clicks are important to direct response campaigns, but they’re only one part of brand advertising, Smallwood said, citing a past Nielsen study, which found no correlation between sales lift and clickthrough rate. Moving forward, Facebook will help its advertisers understand the value of the impressions they’re getting on the social network, as well as determine the optimal reach and frequency for their ads.

Smallwood said there is a “sweet spot” for the number of impressions that maximize ROI, but it might differ for different advertisers depending on the product, the campaign and other factors. For example, some advertisers will find that four impressions per user will increase profit. After that, retail sales might still go up, but not enough to cover the cost of advertising and production. When impressions are more evenly allocated — so one user isn’t seeing an ad twice and another seeing an ad 20 times — advertisers have seen a 40 percent increase in ROI. Facebook is applying these findings, and others related to reach, to its ad products to optimize how it serves ads to users.

Tom Buday, head of marketing and consumer communication at Nestle S.A. who went on stage after Smallwood, addressed some of the articles and conversations that try to declare whether Facebook or other social media platforms “work” or “don’t work” for advertisers. He says success or failure isn’t dependent on the advertising channel. It comes down to brand messages. Once advertisers have a quality message and they understand their overall brand health and performance, they can apply it to platforms like Facebook. Message quality is more important than ever, he said, because of the technology that is available. Not only do consumers have more control over the messages they see, they have the means to share whether they love or hate an ad with millions of people. He said Nestle has found Facebook to be a valuable platform for its different brands, including Gerber USA, which is seeing $3.91 ROI for $1 spent.

Original Source: Brittany Darnell, Inside Facebook

Unlock the 007 in you

Great stuff by Coke

Can Livestrong Survive?

When the news about the USADA ban came out about Lance Armstrong, I posted this “Can Livestrong Live on” post. At the time I wondered if the brand could live on, in the wake of the scandal, and suggested yes it can.

In light of the 1,000 page novel that USADA released this week where they said that he was a “serial” cheat who led “the most sophisticated, professionalised and successful doping programme that sport has ever seen”. It’s probably pertinent to re-visit the question and ask can the charity survive?

In short, I believe Yes they can. But…they need to do a few things:

1. Distance themselves from Lance Armstrong.  I am not suggesting they dump Armstrong, but they would be well advised to distance themselves from him. What do I mean? Well I wouldn’t use him for media events, don’t feature him on the site, get a new chairman. They cannot deny their foundations, and nor should they, but they now need to move on and be an organisation that is about cancer survivors and not Lance Armstrong Cancer Survivor
2. Be clear on their mission. When you go on their site the What We Do statement is “We look at the experiences of the cancer community, find problems and develop solutions. Then we roll them out to help more people in more situations.”. I don’t actually know what this really means, it sounds like research, but Livestrong don’t do or fund research. So they need to really say who they are and what they do. To be fair their homepage does break down where they spend their money, but things like grants are vague (it sounds like research)
3. Be squeaky clean: Livestrong.com is a for profit website that was sold by the charity. A lot of people (including me) end up here looking for information when there really is none. These kind of activities need to stop as the charity comes under scrutiny. Bill Gifford wrote this piece in Outside about the charity in January where he looks at how what they do and how they spend their money.  In parts he focuses on a lot of the wrong things (CEO salary) but he does raise some interesting points. For the charity to survive now they need to be squeaky clean (and I am not suggesting they are not) as they come under increasing scrutiny
4. Shore up their partners: Livestrong need to shore up their own corporate partners and ensure they are supporting the cause and not Lance Armstrong. So, for example, the Nike sponsorship is of Lance Armstrong and Livestrong. The foundation now need to make a distinction between the two and ensure that Nike, even if they decide to continue to support Lance, differentiate their support.
5. Say something: So far Livestrong has said nothing. This cannot last. They are celebrating 15 years, so they need to focus on that, but they need to say something. While Armstrong says he is innocent, this will be a challenge for them, but with the best lawyers and comms people around, surely they can script something that says how disappointed they are but how focussed they are on cancer survivors. They need to talk to their advocates and get their support shored up too.
6. Get new heroes: Lance is no longer a hero. So they need to re-align themselves with new heroes, new survivors. Ordinary people, like you and me (they do some of this already, but they need to do more)
7. Dont go on a marketing blitz: I actually think a brand positioning piece, with a massive media spend, would be a bad move for them now, so I hope they hold off on the temptation
8. Armstrong steps down: Ideally Armstrong should step down. If he truly wants his legacy to be his work in cancer, then he should move aside now and allow the organisation survive and grow without him.

Great apology

OB Tampons wanted to apologise for the discontinuation of one of their products, promising their customers that they will get it back on the shelves in the near future. To apologize, more than 100, 000 women received an email that led them to their own personal music video, and an apology. This viral had more than 3 millions hits only in one weekend. Clearly the brand felt they had something to apologise for, and a good way to go about it.

A practical guide to social media for charities and social enterprises.

But I think this will be useful to lots of people. Click here to go to the guide (produced by Unity Trust Bank and Social Misfits Media)

When Tweets go bad

Did you see this tweet that went out on the Kitchen Aid twitter account last week?

Yes – that’s a bit more than an “Oooops” tweet. According to reports what happened here is the person tweeting meant to send this through their personal twitter account. Which in no way makes it ok. This throws up a whole load of watch outs for brands using twitter.

1. Your staff need to be trained, and re-trained, on how to use twitter

2. If you are using a tool to manage multiple accounts, do not allow your staff add their personal account

3. All staff, even those that don’t have access to your official twitter account, need to be trained on twitter. The most shocking thing about this tweet is the person was willing for it to be seen by the presidential debate stream (see the hashtag). So all staff should be told how to behave on twitter (with some humanity would be a good start for this person). Why is this important ? Because it is really easy to work out where people are working and your brand can, by association, be linked to these tweets.

4. The line “these are personal tweets and do not reflect the thoughts of my employer” mean didley squat.

5. Make sure that someone else is monitoring the tweets (as happened in this case) so you can quickly respond

6. Don’t panic, but act quickly, and respond appropriately

That is what Kitchen Aid did. They reacted quickly, apologised quickly and took action swiftly, See below

A bad online check out – in real life

Hadnt seen this before….great reminder of how frustrating online purchases can be if not done well

Small Denomination Transactions – with your credit card

I have mentioned my “issue” about bag packs in my local supermarket. I never go to the shops with loose change, I only ever go with cards. Every other weekend there is some local group that is doing a bag pack for a cause that I would be more than happy to give a couple of euros to, but I dont have the change.

This could be the solution

 

Its the DipJar. Targetted at customers who want to leave a tip in, lets say a coffee shop. It surely has a role to play in fundraising too? I came across it on springwise, and here is their summary:

The device is a cylinder containing a card slot that can be placed at the point of sale at venues where a tip may be expected, such as a restaurant or hotel. Users insert their card, take it out and wait for the confirmation sound to indicate that the transaction – which is always USD 1 – was successful. Since the sum is a small amount, no PIN is required. If the cardholder wants to leave a tip larger than USD 1, they need only to ‘dip’ their plastic the desired amount of times. Fees on debit and credit card transactions mean that staff actually see USD 0.80 of each dollar at the moment, but the company is working on getting that figure up to around USD 0.90.

DipJar enables service-based businesses to capture tips that otherwise might not be collected due to the difficult nature of charging small amounts to cards.