Facebook on Smartphones: Leads Mobile Engagement

Posted Leave a commentPosted in Random Acts of Progress

According to comScores’s new Mobile Metrix 2.0 report, released on May 7, 2012, Facebook ranks as the most engaging media property among U.S. Smartphone users. The average Facebook mobile user engaged for more than 7 hours in March, 2012. That’s good and bad news for Facebook. The good news is that Facebook’s overall usage and engagement continues to trend up and users spent more time on Facebook in March 2012 than in February 2012 on Smartphones.

The bad news is that Facebook users are starting to spend more time on Facebook on their Smartphones than they are on their desktops (includes laptops, pads, etc.)

Problem is, Facebook is getting pennies on the dollar for mobile ad revenue compared to desktop ad revenue. We talk about this in our recent Blog Post “Never Underestimate the Zuck (Facebook Instagram deal)”. So it seems that as the popularity of accessing Facebook on Smartphones increases, the popularity of accessing Facebook on desktops is declining.

On Facebook, the top ranked mobile media property by engagement, 80 percent of time spent in March 2012 was represented by App usage compared to 20 percent via Browser

Analysis of the share of time spent across Apps and Browsers revealed that even though these access methods had similar audience sizes, Apps drove the lion’s share of engagement, representing 4 in every 5 mobile media minutes. Analysis of the top properties also revealed widely varying degrees of time spent between App and Browser access methods. Also, the Facebook mobile App ranked within the top five Apps on both iOS and Android platforms, securing the #3 spot among iPhone users (80 percent reach) and the #5 position with Android users (68.9 percent reach). Generally, social networking proved to be a particularly popular activity on smartphones with Facebook once again leading the pack among social networking brands (Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.).

Facebook released an interesting disclaimer in its recent IPO filing document

“If users increasingly access mobile products as a substitute for access through personal computers, and if we are unable to successfully implement monetization strategies for our mobile users, our financial performance and ability to grow revenue would be negatively affected.” (Excerpt from Facebook’s Pre-IPO doc). So, Facebook is obviously tuned into the phenomenon of increased mobile usage=decreased desktop usage and is working on their mobile strategy to increase revenue from mobile. We think that at least part of Facebook’s mobile revenue will be driven from the way that Facebook re-implements Instagram and how it accesses Timeline (where some of the ads are now, and more seem likely to come). On the other hand, maybe Facebook will announce a new Facebook Mobile Phone soon. If they do that post-IPO, that announcement could send Facebook’s then public stock soaring 150%. Hmm. Sounds like a plan. We await future Facebook announcements with great anticipation (stay close to this one)!

Big Data and Social Media Analytics

Posted 1 CommentPosted in Random Acts of Progress

Big Data, in case you’re unfamiliar, refers to data sets that are so large that they’re awkward to work with. Forget megabytes or gigabytes. With Big Data we’re currently working with terabytes, petabytes, exabytes and zettabytes of data (over 2.5 quintillion bytes daily and growing). Social Media (as a social instrument of communication) is greatly impacting the growth of Big Data (as an industry); and Big Data is providing established and aspiring social enterprises and organizations with the data to help them understand how to better function, grow and manage as a social business.

Highlights of the daily Big Data stream

1 Billion plus Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and Pinterest visitors generating many Billions of messages, statuses, comments, posts, content uploads, etc.
2 Million plus Blog posts
300 Billion plus emails
22 Million hours of TV Shows and Movies watched on Netflix
2 Billion plus videos watched on YouTube
900,00 plus hours of video uploaded to YouTube
19 Million plus hours of music streamed on Pandora
1 Petabyte plus of game content processed by Zynga

The above list only represents some Big Data data types that we’re most familiar with. There are also financial transactions, imaging data, and much more information that flows into the Big Data stream. To help understand just how big Big Data is, consider this: more data has been created in the past two years than in the entire history of the world before that. Yes, rewind and play if you haven’t heard this statistic before.

Big Data is being used in many ways and in many fields and industries

Big Data is used in Medical research, personalized medicine, computer sciences and business, to name a few. In a Social Business, we rely on Big Data daily and could not operate very well without it. We use Big Data to help manage strategic business functions including: marketing, customer support, sales, and much more. And, Big Data is also starting to help us understand how much of our Social activities contribute to Business ROI, mainly in the marketing area (i.e., we can’t yet effectively measure other business silos as well as marketing). Today, it’s important for all enterprises and organizations to know what their return on investment is relative to what they’re spending on Social. Those numbers are generally looking very good for those social enterprises and organizations that are doing social right and have been doing it for a while.

Think of how far marketing data has traveled from the days of “mention this ad to save 20%”, to today’s robust social analytics software that mines Big Data and helps us analyze what people are thinking, sharing, saying and doing in real-time. With Big Data, in the Social realm we’re able to identify important trends, gauge sentiment for brands and products, and so much more. Essentially, Big Data helps us control the conversation and respond (quickly) to what people really want to talk about; and, introduce content (quickly) that people are really interested in. No doubt, Big Data will help grow many established and aspiring social enterprises and organizations to great heights in the next 2-to-4 years.

Return to top: Big Data and Social Media Analytics

Never Underestimate the Zuck (Facebook Instagram deal)

Posted Leave a commentPosted in Innovation, Random Acts of Progress, Visionary

Facebook recently bought Instagram for one billion dollars. Instagram is the fast, beautiful, fun way to share photos with friends and family. Instagram enables you to snap a picture, choose a filter to transform and theoretically improve its look and feel, then post to Instagram’s website. And you can share to Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr too – it’s photo sharing, reinvented, and super easy to do. But, still, it’s reinvented; not exactly new or groundbreaking. So, why exactly did Facebook buy Instagram and why does that matter?

Facebook doesn’t need Instagram’s 30 million users.

It already has 850 million of its own. And Facebook’s ultra-simple built-in photo app is the most popular app on Facebook. So, why? Is Facebook predicting that its user acquisition rate will slow down? Don’t think so. They’ll likely hit a billion users sometime in the next year just on autopilot. Facebooks upcoming IPO guarantees that they’ll be spending most of their time and treasure on increasing revenues, not users. Of course, most of that is ad revenue. Instagram comes with users but no revenue and no obvious way to monetize their user base.

The Facebook Instagram deal looks like it’s a pure mobile play.

But, Facebook already has lots of mobile users. Well over 400 million users per month use Facebook on their mobile devices; and Facebook offers mobile apps on just about every platform. Problem is, Facebook is getting pennies on the dollar for mobile ad revenue compared to desktop ad revenue. In light of the upcoming IPO, Wall Street analysts are surely looking at this acquisition from the PoV of “how much revenue does the acquisition bring to the table v. the expense of keeping Instagram running and of course the one billion dollar price tag?”.

OK, this might be a bit of a stretch but maybe not. Facebook doesn’t own a piece of the image acquisition part of the mobile market. Instagram does. So, maybe Facebook is thinking that instead of Instagram users posting the images to Instagrams website, that users will start posting them to Facebooks timeline. That would result in more opportunities to serve ads to the desktop and of course that would increase revenues. I for one would like to see Facebooks spreadsheets on that one though since Facebook still has to recoup their one billion dollar investment and that will not be easy.

Maybe Facebook doesn’t have much of a choice?

Facebook wants a big piece of the mobile market and their current mobile offering may take too much time to develop into a revenue-generating service. Mobile image acquisition isn’t part of Facebook’s current mobile service but maybe that’s exactly what they need right now. The Instagram purchase, complete with business infrastructure and 30 million users, would instantly accelerate Facebook’s market share of the mobile market, and interface with Facebook in a way that increases Facebooks ad revenues on the desktop. Now this could be a Facebook mobile service that makes Wall Street happy. Right?

So, maybe the new Facebook Instagram service will enable users to quickly and easily take beautiful pictures, seamlessly share them to their Facebook timeline and friends, and Facebook gets to serve more ads to the desktop where they make their money. Maybe this is starting to sound like a match made in heaven. Never underestimate the Zuck.

Graphic created by: Online MBA Programs

Return to top: Why Facebook Bought Instagram and Why That Matters?

We’d like to hear your thoughts on our Facebook Instagram post. You can share them in the comments section below.

The Road Less Travelled: Social Business ROI

Posted Leave a commentPosted in Random Acts of Progress

In 2006, most companies believed that Social Media was nothing more than a passing fad. And as with most disruptive technologies or business models in the early stages, there was no ROI in sight. But some companies began experimenting with Social Media and started to see its potential for new sales, marketing and support channels. And the revolution began.

Just a small group of companies and dedicated people, let’s call them Social Starters, got Social Media going. Mostly, Social Starters came from marketing and customer support areas. They started out by simply monitoring customer comments and feedback. Social Starters often became team leaders when social teams were eventually put into place. Many of the first teams started focusing on specific Social Media channels; instead of experimenting with numerous ones like the Social Starters did at the very beginning. Since different channels can produce different results for different organizations, this more focused approach resulted in more measurable results and they were encouraging. Soon, Social Media policies and procedures became more formalized and standardized including training and tools. With that, social teams were better able to determine how Social Media added to the value of the business.

Over time, more measurable and positive results started to come in. It became the norm for companies to listen and interact with the customer and as a result they were seeing an increase in satisfied customers, more traffic to their Websites and social channels, and an increase in sales and repeat customers; all directly attributable to Social Media initiatives. We were starting to see solid results of Social Media contributing to Business ROI. And as the results became impossible to deny, not only did all levels of the organization became more accepting of Social Media — the highest-level company executives became public advocates. Companies started to think of, and refer to, themselves as Social Enterprises.

Today, a true Social Enterprise listens to and considers customer concerns a top priority. It can anticipate customer needs, and market and promote products far quicker than ever before. Customer satisfaction and loyalty is at an all-time high. Customers remark that their needs are anticipated and their ideas are influential. Employees are more productive, stakeholders are more engaged and campaigns are more efficient since there is no guess work on what customers want and need. This is a major breakthrough for enterprises of all shapes and sizes, including cause companies, non-profits and other business organizations both public and private. And, probably most important of all, today’s true Social Enterprise relates to its social communities as real people: customers, employees and stakeholders; instead of just a way to make a profit. Although the disruption and revolution phases are almost over and Social Business ROI is getting stronger, there’s still more to do.

Sources/References:
(1) Social Business ROI: Myths and Successes
(2) Google Analytics Social Reports Ties Social Channels to Business ROI
(3) Social Business and the Growth of Shared Value [Infographic]

The bad news is that Facebook users are starting to spend more time on Facebook on their Smartphones than they are on their desktops (includes laptops, pads, etc.)

On Facebook, the top ranked mobile media property by engagement, 80 percent of time spent in March 2012 was represented by App usage compared to 20 percent via Browser

Facebook released an interesting disclaimer in its recent IPO filing document

Social media marketing and sharing is dominated by the big five: Facebook, YouTube, Stumble Upon, Twitter and Pinterest

Source: StatCounter Global Stats – Social Media Market Share

Social Media Infographic: Social Networking Sites

Highlights of the daily Big Data stream

Big Data is being used in many ways and in many fields and industries

Related Posts in Big Data, Business ROI and Social Business ROI:

Facebook doesn’t need Instagram’s 30 million users.

The Facebook Instagram deal looks like it’s a pure mobile play.

Maybe Facebook doesn’t have much of a choice?