Corporate Eye

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Archives for July 2013

Half of Online Display Ads Don’t Appear

stopwatchA recent study from comScore found that 54% of display ads were not seen, which as you can imagine, is bad news for advertisers trying to get their brands in front of online audiences. In fact, the results could be much worse for advertisers. The comScore study recorded any ad that was at least 50% on screen and visible on screen for at least one second. How many advertisers would be happy if consumers saw their ads for one second?

World News Publishing Focus reports that many advertisers are now requiring online publishers to include viewability clauses in their ad contracts to ensure that advertisers get the brand exposure they’re expecting.

The problem in low viewability for display ads happens for a few reasons. For example, both technical issues and human error could cause an ad not to render properly. Intentional publisher negligence could also cause ads to go unviewed. However, the statistics from the comScore report only tell part of the story. In reality, many of those ads that were reported as going unseen were actually included on publisher websites per the advertising agreement. However, for many reasons, including a visitor scrolling quickly past an ad as they scroll down the page, these ads were visible to visitors’ for less than one second.

As World News Publishing Focus reports, advertisers have to find ways to ensure that their ads are seen. New ad units are helping advertisers get noticed online, but the more intrusive display ads become, the more negative brand backlash they can create. Moving some ad budget dollars to online video advertising is another option that advertisers can take, but video advertising is also far from perfect.

At the very least, advertisers may start paying premium prices for online ad placement that not only ensures ads are seen but that those ads are seen for more than one second each. Native advertising is an alternative that recent research has shown to be very effective for advertisers, but investing in sponsored content has problems of its own.

How are you ensuring your online display ads are seen? Have you shifted any of your marketing budget away from display advertising due to lack of viewability? Leave a comment and share your thoughts on display ads, viewability clauses, and native advertising.

Image: Jean Scheijen

Fortune 500 Companies Active in Social Media in 2013

new_yorkFortune 500 companies are actively using social media more in 2013 than ever before. According to research from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, every form of social media activity tracked among Fortune 500 companies since the research was first conducted in 2008 grew this year, including the use of corporate blogs, Facebook Pages, Twitter, YouTube, and Pinterest. Fortune 500 companies are also active on Google+, Instagram, and Foursquare.

According to the research report authors, Twitter is used by the highest number of Fortune 500 companies (77%) and was also the social media site that saw the most growth since 2012 (7% in a tie with YouTube). Detailed results follow, and you can read the full report on The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Market Research website. It’s important to point out that the data collected in this study focused on corporate social media profiles and activities, not brand-specific activities. You can read about the methodology behind the study by visiting the website link above to access the full report.

Blogs

More than one out of three (34%) of Fortune 500 companies are publishing corporate blogs (a 6% increase from 2012), and 79% of those blogs are current, have RSS feeds, and allow comments, making them truly social. Believe it or not, three of the top five Fortune 500 companies don’t have blogs, but overall, 47% of all Fortune 500 blogs are published by the top 200 corporations. These blogs come from 171 corporations in 58 of the 75 industries represented in the Fortune 500.

Twitter

More than three out of four (77%) of companies in the Fortune 500 have corporate Twitter profiles with at least one tweet published within the past month (a 4% increase over 2012). Eight of the top 10 companies in the Fortune 500 have corporate Twitter accounts. Overall, 43% of all Fortune 500 corporate Twitter accounts are managed by the top 200 corporations. These Twitter accounts come from 387 companies in 72 of the 75 industries represented in the Fortune 500.

Facebook

Nearly three out of four (70%) of Fortune 500 companies have corporate Facebook Pages, which is a 4% increase over 2012. Overall, 41% of all Fortune 500 corporate Facebook Pages are published by the top 200 companies. The 348 companies that are active on corporate Facebook Pages come from 72 of the 75 industries represented in the Fortune 500.

YouTube

Nearly three out of four (69%) of companies in the Fortune 500 have corporate YouTube accounts, which is a 7% increase from 2012.

Pinterest

Nearly one out of ten (9%) of companies in the Fortune 500 have Pinterest boards, which is a 5% increase from 2012.

Google+

More than one out of three (35%) Fortune 500 companies have corporate Google+ accounts that are active. This is the first year that the research for this study included Google+.

Instagram

Nearly one in ten (9%) of Fortune 500 companies have corporate Instagram accounts. This is the first year that the study research included Instagram.

Foursquare

Nearly one out of ten (9%) of companies in the Fortune 500 have corporate Foursquare accounts). 2013 is the first year that Foursquare was included in the study research.

Final Thoughts

As the study authors explain, “Rank clearly impacts social media adoption.” The study found companies that rank higher in the 2013 Fortune 500 list are more likely to adopt and actively use social media than companies that rank lower on the list. This holds true for all social media sites analyzed in the study.

It’s also interesting to note that 59% of Fortune 500 companies that are using social media provide links to their social media profiles from their corporate website home pages, which makes their social content easily accessible to customers, investors, vendors, journalists, and more. Surprisingly, 41% of Fortune 500 companies make it a lot harder to find their corporate social media profiles. You’ll need to do some searching to find them.

What do you think of this study’s findings? Does your company maintain active corporate social media profiles? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.

Image: Simona Dumitru

Social: Coca-Cola and Social Proof

coca-cola-social-sWith a well-maintained blog, and over 68 million likes on Facebook, Coca-Cola shows that they are one of the most popular companies around.

Information about their social media is showcased brilliantly at the bottom of every page on their website, along with icons that double as links to their profiles on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and more. Also, Coca-Cola provides a section called “Opinions” that allows users to take part in online debates and conversations, each one having an impressive number of comments below it. This further showcases Coca-Cola’s popularity, and engages the audience.

This display of popularity sets Coca-Cola apart from rival companies in a unique way. Reputation cannot be faked, and Coca-Cola builds trust from the audience by proving their credibility in the online world.

Pinterest Becomes More Personalized and Ad-Ready

push pins pinterestOn Friday, Pinterest announced the release of two new features that leverage the massive amount of data it has at its disposal about its growing user audience. By analyzing both the content users pin and like on Pinterest as well as sites they visit outside of Pinterest that have the Pin It button, Pinterest will provide more personalized recommendations for additional content that users might like.

According to an article on the Pinterest blog, a new Edit Your Home Feed button is available which enables users to edit the content they see online or on their mobile devices to get their feed the way they want it. Ke Chen, Pinterest Software Engineer, explains, “Go to Follow Boards to see stuff you might like based on what you’ve been pinning. Or go to Unfollow Boards to stop seeing stuff you’re not that into anymore.” The more you pin, the better Pinterest’s board recommendations will get.

Pinterest also announced that it will provide more suggestions for pins and boards users might want to follow based on the websites they visit that have the Pin It button on them. For example, Pinterest might suggest boards about weddings to a Pinterest user who is planning a wedding and visits a lot of wedding sites that have the Pin It button.

Pinterest does offer a way to turn off the tracking features within users’ account settings, but they’re turned on by default.

What Does This Mean for Brands?

People have been speculating for some time that Pinterest is preparing to follow in other social sites’ footsteps by rolling out advertising in order to bring in some revenue. Cotton Delo of AdAge speculates that the roll out of personalization features using the data Pinterest collects is a major step to bringing Pinterest advertising to life. Cotton suggests three ways Pinterest might turn this data into advertising opportunities:

  1. Selling promoted pins to brands.
  2. Building audience segments to sell to marketers who want to advertise on Pinterest.
  3. Starting an ad network.

The opportunities are huge. Brands want to connect with consumers on Pinterest. It’s a highly visual medium used primarily by women who, research shows, make or influence the vast majority of purchase decisions. Pinterest also has a highly engaged audience, so it’s critical that advertising which is introduced doesn’t damage the user experience. As more and more Facebook users express frustration with the growth of promoted posts and ads that clutter the content they actually want to see, Pinterest should be taking notes and applying the lessons learned to its own future advertising efforts.

What do you think of the future of Pinterest advertising and the company’s use of behavioral tracking? Would your brand be an early adopter of Pinterest advertising if the opportunity presented itself? Leave a comment below and share your thoughts.

Image: Chris Cummings

Should Brand Marketers Worry about Gmail Tabs?

email marketing messageHundreds of millions of people around the world use Google’s email application, Gmail, to send and receive email messages each day. At the same time, brand marketers around the world are trying to connect with consumers through email marketing.

As a result, it’s safe to say that a large number of Gmail users receive email marketing messages, and until now, those marketing messages appeared in each user’s Gmail inbox mixed in with all of the other messages they got. That’s not necessarily the case anymore, and brand marketers who rely on email marketing are worried about it.

In simplest terms, the problem is this—Google launched Gmail tabs, which automatically categorizes users’ incoming email messages into separate tabs within the Gmail dashboard. The default tabs are:

  • Primary: Messages from friends and family, as well as any other messages that don’t appear in other tabs.
  • Promotions: Deals, offers, and other promotional emails.
  • Social: Messages from social networks, media-sharing sites, online dating services, gaming platforms, and other social websites.
  • Updates: Notifications such as confirmations, receipts, bills, and statements.
  • Forums: Messages from online groups, discussion boards, and mailing lists.

Users can choose which tabs they want to use and new message counts will appear in the header area of each tab making it easy for users to see when they have new messages in tabs they’re not currently viewing.

The goal of Gmail tabs is to streamline the process of reading your email messages by enabling you to see your most important messages first with less important messages categorized for viewing later. It’s a great idea for people who like to stay very organized and aren’t afraid that they’ll miss something important if all of their messages aren’t visible through a single view. However, the news isn’t as good for brand marketers.

The introduction of the Promotions tab in Gmail means that messages Google identifies as promotional in any way will go directly into that tab. It’s easier for users to delete them there, and it’s easier for users to forget to look for them there. This is particularly problematic for email marketers who send short-term deals and offers with quick expiration dates. Brand marketers have a reason to be worried. Open, click-through, and conversion rates are likely to drop among Gmail users if there is widespread adoption of Gmail tabs.

Of course, you can remind your Gmail audience to move your messages to the Primary tab so they don’t get lost in the Promotions Tab in the future (once a message is moved to the Primary tab, all similar messages should go to that tab in the future). However, the introduction of Gmail tabs creates an additional step that tired email users will have to take to receive information from your brand. Each additional step equates to lower response rates for brands.

The most important thing brand marketers can do is to make sure their email marketing messages and offers are better than ever. To motivate a consumer to move your brand email messages from the Promotions tab to the Primary tab in Gmail, you’ll need to up your game and send irresistible content that is worthy of appearing alongside of their most important messages in the Primary tab.

In other words, what can you do to make your email marketing messages Primary tab-worthy?

Image: Ilker

Rebranding HSN as the Brand Hero

credit card shoppingHSN has come a long way since the early days of home shopping and HSN.com, and the HSN marketing team wants to make sure women know it. With a complete rebranding, HSN will be positioned as the hero to women who think the brand is outdated. The HSN rebranding makes a specific effort to attract younger women through the use of updated packaging, taglines, fonts, television scripts, and more.

The new tagline simply states, “It’s fun here.” The marketing push focuses on building customer trust in the brand through mobile and digital where nearly half of HSN’s sales and new customers come from.

Rebranding HSN is a good move (albeit a bit late), and should help to position the brand for the evolving television commerce industry. With the growth in multiple display use and original programming online, the convergence of television, mobile, and commerce is poised to catalyze this type of shopping in new ways. Gone are the days of the HSN and television commerce of ten or twenty years ago. This type of shopping will look very different in just a few years.

Natalie Zmuda of Ad Age reports that HSN hopes to remove its reliance on celebrities selling their products to define its own brand. Instead, the rebranding will allow HSN to stand on its own as a relevant brand. Already, HSN is leveraging social media to support its rebranding strategy with Google+ Hangouts that don’t necessarily rely on celebrities.

Anytime a brand controls its own success rather than relying on third parties (including celebrities) is a smart move. If HSN continues to move in the right direction, it might start to carve out a larger market share against its top competitor, QVC, and it might be able to lead the next phase of the television commerce industry as online and what we’ve known as traditional television become more and more integrated in the coming years.

What do you think? Leave a comment below and share your thoughts on the HSN rebranding as well as the future of television commerce overall.

Image: Philippe Ramakers