By: Stacey Furtado
We’ve seen some big announcements from Facebook this week. On the social network’s earnings call, Facebook reported its first quarter revenue increased 72% to $2.5 billion (analysts expected $2.36 billion). They followed that up with a new acquisition of fitness-tracking app Moves and the launch of Facebook Newswire, the product of a new partnership with Storyful. But Facebook wasn’t the only one making news this week in the social space. Here’s a look at some of our favorite thoughts from social marketing leaders.
Monday:
- The quote: “But today’s bots, to better camouflage their identity, have real-sounding names. They keep human hours, stopping activity during the middle of the night and picking up again in the morning. They share photos, laugh out loud — LOL! — and even engage in conversations with each other. And there are millions of them.” – Nick Bilton (New York Times)
- Why it matters: In this piece from Nick Bilton, he looks at the sheer number of bots on social networks and motivations behind them, helping us understand why they pose such a great threat to the social communities of big brands. Its been estimated that 1 in 10 Twitter accounts are fake and its getting harder and harder to decipher which is which. The best way to protect against these faux profiles? Know your brand community and be sure its biggest advocates are driving interactions, not these faceless bots.
Tuesday:
- The quote: “Establishing a social media strategy is more than just posting an update informing people that a new product or service is on sale. It’s more than just sharing a piece of relevant information. A social media strategy is a success when you are able to engage and interact with your target audience.” – John Rampton (Forbes)
- Why it matters: Often times brands and agencies will build a well thought-out, dynamic social strategy and then scratch their heads at the end of the quarter wondering why it hasn’t performed the way they hoped. The key to a great, not good, social strategy is in the execution. Getting your hands dirty in your brand’s community by commenting, liking, replying, pinning and loving your fans is not only the most fun way to ensure your social strategy’s success, it’s the best way.
Wednesday:
- The quote: “Social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook drive about 26% of all traffic to online news stories according to the analytics provider Chartbeat–even more if you’re Upworthy or BuzzFeed, to the point that social referral traffic overshadows everything else” – Nicholas Diakopoulos (Fast Company)
- Why it matters: In this article about social deviance (the act of violating a social norm like voyeurism, stealing, etc.), Diakopoulos explores the facts surrounding viral content. Understanding what users are sharing and why on Facebook and Twitter is a big motivator for these major social networks when it comes time to create more efficient algorithms. Sentiment and emotion are important for brands to remember when building content, but the numbers show that the draw of controversy and bad behavior still holds court when it comes to viral news.
Thursday:
- The quote: “For a lot of people, the knowledge that Facebook’s computers are deciding what stories to show them–and which ones to hide–remains galling. Avid Twitter users swear by that platform’s more straightforward chronological timeline, which relies on users to carefully curate their own list of people to follow. But there’s a reason that Facebook’s engagement metrics keep growing while Twitter’s are stagnant. As much as we’d like to think we could do a better job than the algorithms, the fact is most of us don’t have time to sift through 1,500 posts on a daily basis. And so, even as we resent Facebook’s paternalism, we keep coming back to it.” – Will Oremus (Inc.)
- Why it matters: 1.01 billion people sign into Facebook every month. The sheer volume of users allows Facebook to get an incredible amount of information on its users to help them inform its algorithm. The better a job Facebook does at figuring out what makes its users click, the more crucial it becomes in its users’ daily lives. This formula motivates most of the social network’s actions and acquisitions and is what will keep it relevant for years to come.
Friday:
- The quote: “Incentivize customers to sell your product for you. You won’t nurture brand advocacy by force-feeding users your tired marketing message. Instead make it worth their while to talk about your brand.” – Firas Kittaneh (Entrepreneur)
- Why it matters: Firas, we feel you. Brand advocacy is the holy grail of word of mouth marketing and it’s not found by writing checks. Brands have to make their customers fall in love if they want them to spread that love around to their family and friends. Not only is this the most effective way to win new business, but its the most consistent way to ensure customers come back.
And we don’t typically do this, but we though we really needed to give props to Ben Collins for bringing this to our attention in Esquire this week. Thanks, Ben!
