Digital Connections – 360i Blog, Digital Marketing Agency

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This week, Facebook announced that its Sponsored Stories ad product will begin appearing in the news ticker on the homepage. Sponsored Stories debuted in January, allowing brands to leverage organic user activities (e.g. page Likes, page posts, apps used) as advertising within Facebook.  Sponsored Stories run in both premium ad placements and in Facebook’s self-service Marketplace. 

Integrating Sponsored Stories into the news ticker marks another move by Facebook to blur the lines between paid and earned media. These types of ad placements have proven successful for advertisers like 360i client USA Network, which has seen Sponsored Stories drive higher response rates at a lower CPC than other advertising efforts focused on engaging fans.  These results are not surprising, as adding the ‘personal’ element of a friend’s activity into an ad increases the likelihood of response.

Sponsored Stories running in the ticker will be priced and targeted the same way as Sponsored Stories running in Marketplace.  Advertisers will not be able to target Sponsored Stories to or exclude Sponsored Stories from the ticker.  For those buying Sponsored Stories on a CPC, the click is counted when the user clicks through to the brand content.  Facebook counts an impression when a Sponsored Story appears at the top of the ticker.  Sponsored Stories do not run lower in the ticker and impressions are only counted once – despite the fact that a user may see the Sponsored Story multiple times. 

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Today, we published a report on The New Era of Online Listening. Over the past few years, the practice of online listening (also called buzz monitoring or social media monitoring) has gone from an obscure research concept to a rapidly growing and bona fide research methodology, adopted by many brands across industry verticals.

But with such rapid growth and with the proliferation of companies offering listening services ranging from fully automated solutions to manual, human-powered analyses of online conversations, what is the right model for incorporating online listening into your research approach? What is listening best used for? How often should it be used? Most importantly, what decisions does it help drive?

To help sort out these questions, we’ve outlined what we consider the most important considerations for listening, and how to approach setting up a listening program that is both efficient and customized to the needs of your brands and your business. Read and download our full report to learn more.

-Shilpa Brahmbhatt, Lara Hejtmanek, R.G. Logan, Lee Maicon and Danielle Mormile contributed to this report.

Google recently switched on encrypted search by default for any user logged in to a Google Account (Gmail, Picasa, Google+ Google Analytics, etc.). Google’s objective in doing so is to better safeguard the privacy of its users as they perform searches on Google. With encrypted search activated, search queries and search traffic is encrypted (using the industry standard SSL protocol) to prevent eavesdropping from intermediary parties that might have access to a user’s network. Essentially, this feature prevents others from seeing what keywords are being searched for when the searcher is logged in to a Google Account.

Today, for users who’ve received the update, logging in to their Google account will automatically flip them over to the secure version of Google.com (https://www.google.com – note the extra “s”) when performing a Google Web search. While this can be perceived as a positive step towards increased privacy, the key ramification of this, which impacts marketers directly, is that the keyword search terms which refer a logged in searcher to any website is removed by Google. This directly impacts our ability to understand what content resonates with the search audience and how effectively searchers are converting from search.

Google has proclaimed that this privacy measure will only impact 10% or less of search traffic, but as we take a deeper look into the change, this number appears to be an overly conservative estimate. Furthermore, as Google continues to promote its Google+ service, which revolves around users being actively authenticated, we could see the impact grow even further.

Ironically, Google has exempted Adwords search marketing ads from having this valuable keyword data obfuscated to marketers. How this double standard reconciles itself with the spirit of privacy under which this change was brought about is anyone’s guess.

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In a recent interview with CSP Magazine, 360i’s Gavin Blawie, VP of Client Strategy, discusses the digital media landscape, emerging trends in consumer behavior and what these mean for brands  both on and offline. Read his full Q&A below.

1. What component of digital media and marketing is biggest on your radar today?

The ability for brands to create original, compelling content that is interesting/cool/entertaining enough to be shared, in regular ways big and small.  The converse is latent but equally powerful – the ability to harness and activate original brand-inspired content being created and shared by consumers on a brand’s behalf.  Either way, it’s the consumer’s judgment call and choice to share or not, and the marketer’s opportunity to accept and work within that reality as the new filter.

2. We’re starting to hear a lot about social commerce. What is it?

Social commerce represents the same connected, always-on network of personal conversations, observations and sharing that now sits atop, within and alongside consumers’ shopping experiences.  Brands can now connect with people online, and as people share more and more of their lives, people routinely post consumer reviews and share shopping experiences for everything from big ticket, considered purchases (“just got the 60” big screen TV”, “great vacation in Jamaica, too bad I stayed at…” etc.) to ordinary, impulse buys (“slice of pizza and a Coke for lunch”).  

These personal updates represent primary insights and selling opportunities shared every day across the social web, and their effects can be seen from the rise of social customer service (the airlines listen to tweets much more than 800 #s) to the ads you’re served online, to the “items recommended for you” next time you log into Amazon. For more on social commerce, download 360i’s latest playbook.

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Google announced yesterday its long awaited Brand Page opportunity for marketers. This addition to Google’s suite of products and solutions for marketers is unlike anything previously available.

Brand Pages are not like Facebook or Twitter because they have a direct impact on search engine optimization and paid media performance. And unlike other forms of SEO and media programs, there will be ways to share content and galvanize communities. But Google+ Brand Pages are not a panacea that instantly improves all other marketing programs. Google+ will evolve constantly, often in ways brands will appreciate, but occasionally in ways that may pose challenges for some brands.

Nonetheless, marketers for the vast majority of major brands should plan to participate in Google+ Brand Pages. The potential value is too high, as is the potential opportunity loss for brands whose competitors establish strong footholds first. Our new whitepaper (available to read and download below) presents a simplified overview of what you can expect from Brand Pages.

Halloween treats are not just about candy corn and Tootsie Rolls anymore. In fact, those classic staples were not the focal point of consumer conversations in the days leading up to the Halloween weekend. Instead, social media chatter centered more so on homemade creations (recipe/idea sharing), and healthy ways to celebrate the holiday.

People enjoyed sharing their recipes (comprising almost 45 percent of treat-centered conversations) along with photos of their spooky creations as they dressed their treats up for Halloween.

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