Social Networking – From Making Friends to Making Money
By LI Zhi-wei
What kind of sparks do you get if you combine the two most popular trends today: "social networking" and "digital reading"?
When the Apple App Store released the digital reading software, Flipboard, at the end of July 2010, it immediately caught the eye of international media and famous bloggers. Within just a few hours, through word of mouth, it had become the top-ranked download. Flipboard emphasizes that it is a "social magazine" offering unique, personalized content for every reader based on their social networking habits and content shared by their friends, such as holiday photos, news that they "liked", or videos reposted from Youtube.
The most innovative aspect of Flipboard is the fact that it does not generate any content itself per se. All of the magazine’s content comes from the user's own activities on the social networking media, or are sourced from popular blogs and news websites overseas. The software settings and filters built into Flipboard automatically organizes the user's social networking feeds and selects content that the user will be interested in based on their past activities on social networks. Content generation and distribution is completely personalized and since Flipboard can generate content tailored to a reader of any type and culture, it can help develop a more diversified audience. The mechanism that makes all this possible is the social filtering function that has now been under development for some time now.
The integration of social filtering means the advertisements shown on social networking media are generated using content recommended by the user's friends. These advertisements are generated because the user's friends have actually bought the product and recommended it on a social network. This type of social advertising offers a more personal touch and reduces the user's wariness towards ads. Instead, users want to know what products were purchased by their friends and what their recommendations were, delivering exactly the kind of effect advertising hopes to achieve.
Social Media Brings Opportunities to the Door
By ZHANG Da-wei
Last year the "CoCo" beverage chain launched a NT$7 drink promotion and sold 120,000 drinks in just one week. By transmitting the message of this promotion to social networks throughout Taiwan and providing an ordering and payment processing system, the online food ordering website, 17Life (PayEasy Group), instantly brought tens of thousands of customers to CoCo outlets everywhere.
17Life President, Li Yi-teng, said that a few years ago social networks were generally “site-centric”, being filled with strangers that meet each other on a blog or forum. Recently social networking websites like Facebook have embraced a "people-centric" approach where Internet users interact with people they know personally in real life or online.
"17Life offers everyone in the same office or venue with a free ordering system for food & drink ordering system that makes things easier for people placing orders," Li said. The idea of making it easier for people placing orders led to the creation of a new service – 17P Special, a limited time, limited quantity, and limited number instant group buying service. First pioneered by the Groupon website in the U.S., 17Life can be considered the first website to successfully launch this business model in the Asia-Pacific region. This was how CoCo managed to extend its advertising reach to offices and ring up big sales of its beverages without opening an online store.
With over a million members, Atlaspost recently launched its own "Million User Group Buy Network" to bring social networking to traditional retailers as well. Most people in Taipei, for example, had never visited the Miniatures Museum of Taiwan. However, thanks to the power of social networking it managed to sell 1,486 tickets in just one day.
Combining the Real and Virtual
Recreational Experiences Instantly Shared at Coca Cola Village
By QIN Cheng-jia
The Israeli company, Promarket, came up with a clever idea for travelers who want to have fun and also easily share their experiences online at the same time. At the Coca Cola Village 2010 summer camp for teenagers organized by Coca Cola, Promarket combined wireless RFID bracelets with the social networking site Facebook to provide teenagers with the ability to automatically post messages and photos during their stay.
Yoni Saar, the founder and creative director of Promarket said that each summer camp ran for 3 days and attracted an average of 650 teenagers aged from 16 to 18 each day. Teens who attended received a RFID bracelet upon arrival, which was later linked to their Facebook account. Scattered everywhere inside the camp were RFID sensor boxes marked with the Facebook's thumb's up symbol for "Like". If the teens were satisfied with service for that area or really enjoyed the food or drink, they simply had to place the bracelet near the “Like” symbol and the system would automatically post the comment on the event's Facebook wall for other Internet users to respond to. To later check on the responses and answer friends or relatives, attendees could go online at one of the many computer areas in the camp.
Some of the sensor boxes were equipped with cameras as well. Apart from not having to worry about getting their camera wet, the teens could also instantly upload their photos to Facebook to share with friends and relatives. The system, which gave attendees’ the power to instantly upload photos to Facebook for friends to see and respond to, generated 35,000 posts and responses in a single day and was able to exert a huge amount of social influence.
Ugly Sites Sell
By CAI Yan-zhi
People who really understand Internet marketing don't want advertisements. What they want is "direct-effect marketing" that incorporates precision or one-to-one marketing. In other words, they want marketing that translates into direct sales and not the anticipated returns of brand-name marketing. In direct-effect marketing, the advertisement asks the audience to take some form of immediate action, such as making a phone call, filling out personal information, or making a purchase straight away.
For example, imagine someone suffering from migraines decides to visit two websites to look for a solution. Website A begins by presenting XXX Pharmaceuticals, or XXX Medical Center and then talks up the company's long history and professional expertise. As for Website B, the first thing you see is the following in bold: "3 Ways for Immediate Migraine Relief." Which website do you think the consumer will bother reading? The answer is obviously Website B.
One phrase that has become quite popular in the overseas Internet marketing industry is: "Ugly sites sell." The reason behind this is that pretty websites have most likely been created by designers with artistic flair. Artistic designers, however, tend to be resistant to commercialization. As such, they may not fully understand a customer's needs or sales slogans and techniques. The result is they create websites that look good, but don’t actually sell anything.
Most people think that brand marketing is about promoting the company's name or products with as much advertising space as possible. In reality, letting the brand name take up all the prime advertising real estate is a real waste.
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