Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
Facebook is Marketers’ Gold Mine
So I’m sure this is by no means breaking news, as I think its been pretty obvious for the past three years now, and its the biggest argument most large ad agencies/marketing firms have for the use of Social Media, but Wired has a great little article on how Facebook has become a gold mine for Marketers’ looking to hone in on specifically what people are ‘into’ these days.
Lets face it, Facebook, Twitter, (formerly) MySpace, (RIP) Friendster, we’ve all fallen victim to their allure. Its like a drug you just can’t seem to kick. Its the epic quest for constant connection not only to the entire ‘virtual world’ but to the people already know in a ‘non-virtual’ realm. So we talk back and forth about ‘last night’s #LOST episode’ or we ‘Favorite’ Tina Fey or we ‘take a quiz’ that determines what celebrity we most ‘identify’ with. All these little ’social’ activities are pushed to our friends and our friends push things back at us. We’re dumping more information into the machine that we even realize. Now I’m not saying this is a bad thing, its not at all, but what’s happening is we’re creating a brilliant little index that can be sorted through with the greatest of ease. Want to see what the primary Viewing Audience is for Grey’s Anatomy (I know, I watch it… I just HAVE TO KNOW how Izzie’s gonna die)? Easy. Wanna know what people are saying about the new Honda Insight? Even Easier!
So what does this all mean? Well, it means a lot of different things. I think first and foremost its living proof that the concept of how we advertise to an audience has completely changed. It also means that the way we’re gathering the evidence used to tailor or communication methods has completely changed as well. It ALSO means, everything you post can (and probably will) be used by someone to specifically tailor a marketing method to you (or the greater YOU of people who are also ‘just like you’).
Anyway, just another little ramble on how all these amazing little tools we use on a regular basis are starting to become avenues for mining marketing content. Good or Bad, its happening and its changing things (in my opinion) for the better.
More over at Wired:
http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/04/your-facebook-profile-makes-marketers-dreams-come-true/
