5-23-2012
I knew it was coming. Living in the great netherworld between social media and radio, I?ve come to be able to predict with almost dead-on accuracy what kind of emails I?m going to get, and when.
As soon as the story came out that 50 percent of people think Facebook is a "fad," I heard from just about every social media doubter in radio I know. This, in their eyes, was proof that the masses were going to eventually reject Facebook, as well as all things digital, and channel all that time back to terrestrial radio listening. I reminded them it?s not such an either/or proposition and pointed them to a previous blog I did about multitasking.
Well you can imagine their delight when GM announced they were pulling all paid advertising from Facebook. You?d have thought the "shot heard round the world" happened all over again. They couldn?t have been more pleased.
But let?s think about that. Radio?s entire business proposition has always been that we gather a large mass of users (listeners), and then sell access to those users to advertisers. I don?t know what your cume is, but Facebook has 800 million users worldwide. Anyone in radio who celebrates the fact an advertiser doesn?t feel the need to pay a penny for access to 800 million users needs to stop blasting themselves in the foot.
Not only are those users there, advertisers can drill down to focus their dollars on extraordinarily specific demographics, locations and interests, then get data back on what kind of engagement, if any, their ads got. Can you do that with your over-the-air signal? GM says the paid ads didn?t lead to actual car sales. Really? Did GM find a rock-solid ROI formula for social that none of the rest of the industry has yet discovered? They?re in essence making a statement that branding doesn?t lead to sales. That ain?t good for us in radio folks, so let?s not shoot off fireworks.
The next round of "I told you so" emails I got came after the opening day of Facebook?s IPO. Everyone expected to find me crushed that the stock didn?t skyrocket on Day 1. It was a total validation, in their eyes, that this "social thing" holds no revenue-making value. I wasn?t crushed. I wasn?t even really surprised, given the hammering Facebook took during the pre-IPO blackout period. And again, do we really want to celebrate indications that paid advertising no longer works?
I personally believe Facebook will figure it out. They live, eat, sleep and breathe figuring things out. And by the way, GM never said they weren?t marketing on, and making big investments in, Facebook. It?s just not on their paid ad product side. GM has no problem admitting there?s tremendous value in having the kind of access to consumers and relationship-building functions social offers. And so far, no other big advertiser seems to be following GM?s lead.
If you?re celebrating the rejection, by one company, of paid advertising to reach a cume of 800 million (with heavy "TSL" by the way) because there was no indisputable proof that Ad Dollar X led to Sale Dollar Y?then what the hell are you out there selling?
Mike Stiles is a brand content specialist with the social marketing tech platform Vitrue. Check out his monologue blog The Stiles Files and follow him @mikestiles.
(5/23/2012 1:10:24 AM)
I think Mike might agree that: no matter the perceived strength of the presented certainty or the cut of the corporate suits, Radio people are experiencing a desperation that is relatively new in the industry.
Any small whiff of a cloud over somebody else's turf is considered a sign their doom is imminent.
Of course, that same cloud over our territory is hoped to be a harbinger of blessed rain for parched, radio throats.
Facebook, meanwhile, is seeing to their own knitting. We aren't.
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