Social Networks and Communities
Gaming
Widgets and Wikis
Blogging including micro-blogs (Twitter)
RSS
Podcasting and Videocasting
Virtual Environments
The rate at which facebook and other social media communities grew was much faster than as compared to Television and Radio, because of the present enabling technology. Here is a snippet of Facebook facts.
Here is a video on the Social Media Revolution.
Gaming has been pushed to a new frontier: Real Problems > Real Solutions in a virtual world. Here is a link to IBM’S innov8.
Widgets are now being used in raising Brand Awareness online.
“Interest in widgets is rising as marketers become disaffected by other methods of online advertising, especially on social networks.” Sourced from: Building a Brand with Widgets- Businessweek.
“Some marketers say widgets may do a better job engaging users than, say, so-called banner ads emblazoned across the sides of social network profiles”. Sourced from: Building a Brand with Widgets- Businessweek.
Functionality and new creative content is what people want, consumers want to have something some helpful and useful. They want problem solving Widgets! Widgets are capable of delivering on this need. I believe Widgets have added itself to the viral marketing portfolio.
Here is an interesting link, which is an interview with VideoEgg CEO Matt Sanchez; he discusses how widgets can be used commercially.
Wikis allow world-wide collaboration, and is an example of disruptive technology. Wikipedia has become more reliable and faster at rectifying faults, than other online Encyclopedias. Users online are invited to co-create, add and enhance the content. Collectively users world-wide provide a better Encyclopedia service!
Blogging and micro-blogs (Twitter) as become a vital form viral marketing. Customers, prospects, partners, and colleagues can view your updates. Simple yet effective information is sent to intended audience. Today we are in a Dynamic age, News, information, ideas, all need to be real-time, as our society demands. Blogs are just that, hence they often are ahead of traditional media streams for major stories. Blogging is also a major help in Public Relations. As Sandy Carter discusses it is “an innovative PR media with Strong influence when the bloggers are part of the community/group you need to influence, inform, or seduce.”
As Jeff Schick, IBM’S vice president of Social Software commented, “We have learned that twitter can play an important part in our communications efforts and be a keystone as we raise brand and product awareness/credibility in these nascent communicates of purpose.”
Blog are part of the marketing mix. There is 2 way communication, and fresh dissemination of information and messages.
RSS simply assists busy consumers, marketers and businesses, by providing a summarized version of content online. With the influx of information managing and tracking the important information can become a daunting and time consuming task.
In Podcasting and Videocasting users/corporate entities create media content, which is available to other users, to listen and watch at their leisure. Video casting is growing fast too, both by corporate entities and individuals. Corporate entities have the chance of building enticing fresh creative video, and publish these on the web (example is YouTube) for free. Both Podcasting and Videocasting have elements of co-creation, personalization and viral marketing, which are needed to be competitive.
Virtual environments like Second life are still in the infant stage, nonetheless it is providing new place for marketers to meet consumers, even consumers meeting consumers globally. Growth is increasing and I think more consumers will start to explore this sort of channel in the not so distant future. “Active users on Second Life are around 50000, which is up significantly from 30000 a few months ago” quoting Sandy Carter.
From the above I agree with Mashell McLub’s statement.
Social media is more than a credible marketing channel. It complements the traditional channels in engaging consumers. We can see that as a Marketer you will benefit from a Wide Audience base, dynamic Feedback, Low Cost, and Improved Brand Credibility. These new channels are under the public eye. Everything that you do is viewed by your followers. It is this transparency that will aid and cause the concept of the new vessels to grow.
