Facebook | Indian Social Media Landscape - Part 4 Indian Social Media Landscape

Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Facebook becomes a year book

Monday, October 3rd, 2011

Facebook has made a radical change to its user interface- the first since the launch of Google +. While it would take some time for the entire gamut of changes to make a marked difference to our experience, let us peep under the hood, at how the Facebook is set to change.

Timing the changes

The most striking feature is the new Timeline, a chronological layout of the profile/page which shows everything that the user/page has done since getting on to Facebook. It is a more simple and efficient way of checking out a profile or a page. The interface itself is far neater and clears a lot of clutter. One interesting feature is that now a lot of options have been put in a drop down rather than a separate button.

Each friend is important

Facebook has also introduced new friend lists, which is an optional feature, and is essentially a redesign of a feature it’s had for years—Lists. The original Lists were difficult to navigate and tedious to update, which was the reason for the revamp. If you choose to activate the lists, Facebook will generate four separate lists for you: work, school, family and city. Facebook puts people into these lists based on information they have in their profile. For example, if you list Harvard University as your alma mater, and so do 25 of your Facebook friends, they will be grouped under "school." In addition to this you also get two lists that you curate on your own to distinguish close friends from people you don’t know well.

The news maker

Before these changes, when you logged into Facebook you could toggle between two views of your News Feed: Top News and Most Recent. Now, Facebook combined these two in a single News Feed. Now, what you see when you first log in depends on how frequently you log in. If you don’t visit Facebook regularly, the next time you do you’ll see top photos and status updates that were posted since the last time you visited the site. These are marked with a blue corner. If you log into Facebook frequently, such as several times a day, you’ll likely see the most recent stories first.

1: Top Stories 2: Side Panel 3: Recent Stories

News keeps trickling

Another addition to the system is the Ticker. This is a smart move as all the updates which are not direct interaction with an individual will show up here. Thus, clearing the wall for more direct status updates and relegating your friends Farmville exploits to the ticker. Furthermore, note the updated photos. New Facebook interface is now enlarging its size so it looks more clear and comfortable to view while users navigate and have fun.

Know more than just friends

Subscriptions, another key feature launched recently, lets you see people’s public posts in your News Feed, without having to friend them. And while Facebook Subscriptions is an interesting way to broaden your network and connect with people you otherwise wouldn’t have contact with, it also gives people who had a page and a profile to merge it.

The Verdict

The changes are intended to help you keep up with people that matter to you, regardless of how often you visit the site. The new Timeline interface is beautiful and a major time sink. Overall, Facebook has made profiles more personal. Users are going to be spending hours in their friends’ Timelines. The addition of the Cover Photo makes the Facebook interface more beautiful, and the timeline is easy on the eyes. While it will take some time to get used to the two-column layout, it actually is easier to navigate than the old Facebook. Facebook thought hard about the design of this change.

As a business entity, this means more display space for the brands. The cover photo can actually be used as banner ad space for which they won’t have to spend anything. Also, with expected time spent on Facebook going up, it can only be good news for the brands. What is most interesting though is the fact that Facebook seems to be quite sure of the changes and that could be a worry for Google.

Tags:Facebook, Friends, Social Media, Timeline
Posted in Facebook, Social Media, Social Media Marketing | 1 Comment »

Social media and social responsibility

Thursday, September 15th, 2011

Over the past few years, social media has become an important tool of marketing. Big brands have invested in the new media hoping to hook the audience to their products. And, with the success of the platform, the brands are now looking to leverage the tool for enhancing their brand equity via social causes’ route.

Social responsibility goes social

With growth of Facebook and twitter and the rise of social media marketing, it is no surprise that then this medium would now be used to promote corporate social responsibilities (CSR). While the brands are slowly starting to embrace this route, many social causes have already been promoted to good result via Facebook and other social platforms.

Social Causes Promoted via Social Media

Not just local public cause, social media has played key role in national causes. The public led campaigns against issues in countries like Libya, Egypt and India has shown what this medium is capable of. And if harnessed properly, the medium can deliver like none other.

Reaching the masses

In India, there are 31 million Facebook users, while the total number of active users on social media is expected to be 45 million by year 2012. This platform is growing and how. There is no denying that social media provides the easiest, and most cost effective route of reaching such an audience.

Engaging the influencers

A key tool for any cause based program is to have the experts opinion put forth. A doctor talking about a health related issue makes the cause look that much more credible. Social media provides this opportunity to all the brands.

With over 40000 active bloggers who have built a major clout with their writing, brands can engage with these writers while talking about the cause and make them understand their fight. They in turn would then promote the cause and bring credibility to program.

Philips LinkedIn Innovation in Health

Not just blogs, lot of professionals are on social media, who can be engaged through their inputs and dialogues with general public in order to make the cause support that much more real and beneficial for normal people.

Key Benefits:

It also provides key benefits that any brand looks from a CSR or cause promotion. It helps brands in:

Improving Social Welfare
Establish differentiated brand positioning
Create strong consumer bond
Enhance brand equity
Boost internal morale
Drive Sales
Drive market value of firm

Acceptance of the campaign

A lot of skeptics have questioned the acceptance of a social media campaign. The fact that it is perceived as a youth platform makes them feel the whole seriousness of the issue would be lost. What they are not realizing that in a country like India, 66% percent of the population falls in the youth category. Thus, addressing them on their choice of platform is key to making them talk and think about the cause. And that’s not about it.

End Cause

The result of a social media campaign can be gauged through response generated either through number of people who have registered for the cause or amount of money donated through the program. Also, the success of the program can be gauged through how well the program has been able to improve the lives of people who supported the campaign. There are no shortages of examples of the same in India. Brands like Fair and Lovely have contributed majorly towards growth of the society via this platform. The Fair and Lovely Foundation has reached out to over 300 girls in just 7 years and changed their lives.

Brand led campaigns

Similarly Aircel has managed to build a support of over 300,000 people for save the tiger campaign. The major highlight of this campaign was making people believe that they can contribute to a cause which previously they though they can’t do much about.

And that is the victory that social media can lend to a corporate social responsibility or a cause promotion by a brand. It can make people feel important; it can make them feel like a responsible citizen. That they can make a contribution to any cause that they feel for through this channel makes it that much more powerful.

Tags:Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, Facebook, socail cause, social, word of mouth, youth
Posted in Corporate Communications, Facebook, Social Media | No Comments »

Feeding the Page Likes

Tuesday, August 16th, 2011

If you have seen the film, The Social Network, you would know that Facebook was not looking at putting any advertising on its clean image. Unfortunately, with time and growth, advertisements have crept into the website.

However, Facebook is now making the ads part of the page. Early this year, they launched a new advertising mechanism that promises to make ad units more social and in fact become a true word of mouth promotion rather than pure advertising.

A story to tell

Sponsored Stories, a new advertising technique launched by Facebook, takes news feeds and converts it in to a display unit. This display unit pops up on the right side of your page as you navigate through Facebook. Interestingly, Facebook has placed these stories above ad units. Just goes to show what Facebook hopes to do in the future.

All the Google Plus Points

Friday, July 15th, 2011

Over the last couple of weeks, you may have heard the buzz about Google +, the search giants third attempt at social networking. After disaster becoming the size of Google itself with Buzz and Wave, Google is determined to take on Facebook afresh. And this time, it seems, they have made a good start. As of now at least!

Adding to Google’s might

According to Vic Gundotra and Bradley Horowitz, creators of the new platform, Google+ is more than a social product, or even a social strategy, it’s an extension of Google itself. Hence, ‘Plus’! It is ‘Plus’ because it takes products from Google and makes them better. And that is the key element of Google +. Google already had some of the best platforms online, right from video sharing site (YouTube), photo sharing site (Picasa), and blogging network (Blogger) to video chat facility and unique signing facility of Gmail, which ironically even Facebook has been using for ever.

Google Plus

With Google +, Google wants to replicate our true social structure online. Many may say that Facebook is exactly this but there is a big difference, or so Google would want us to believe. While on Facebook, sharing can be limited, in essence, when you post a comment it goes out to the world. According to Google, that is not true replication of our communication system, where we are communicating with certain groups meaning our topics are restricted from group to group. This is the base difference between Google + and Facebook.

The Circle Advantage

Google+ is built from the ground up around the concept of sharing material with groups of people, called “Circles.” It’s through Circles that users select and organize contacts into groups for optimal sharing. Unlike Facebook, You simply select people from a list of recommended contacts (populated from your Gmail and/or Google Contacts) and drag them into Circles you designate. Once done, you can share anything across all of Google’s service by clicking on the new Google menu bar that will sit atop all the platforms of Google.

Grouping friends in to Circles

Sparking up some fun

One thing that no one can beat Google at is searching for content that you would want or are interested in. The search giant has taken the effort to categorize things on web in to sub heads. When you click on one of the sub heads, you will find a host of links to the related topic. You can read the same and/or share it with your groups. Google believes that, things which are a common interest can "Spark" conversation and this exactly what Sparks does. Google has rightly said that it’s not a search engine or an extension of the same but a sharing engine. Also “Featured interests” area could well become the revenue source for Google +.

Spark up a conversation

Adding some stream

Information appears in your “Stream,” which is akin to Facebook’s news feed. At the top of your stream is a sharing box. Actually two sharing boxes. First, in the navigation bar there’s a “Share” area to the right side. Second, in the Stream itself, there’s a longer box, where you can enter a status update or use icons to upload and share photo and videos. You can also share links or your location, if you’ve allowed Google to track that for you. On mobile devices, you can select from a drop-down of nearby places to check-in.

Adding Stream Through Stream Box

Adding Stream through Share Box

Another Hangout

Google Hangout, amongst all the features given to Google +, is the stand out feature and one that can really push people to switch from Facebook to Google +. The key is to get several people all involved casually, rather than to barge in with a solitary invite. It is like finding people who are already there for talking rather than dropping in uninvited. Hence the name Hangout! It is like the real world hangout where people gather to talk. If you’re chatting with a Circle, everyone else in that Circle will get an alert to come hang out. This works for up to 10 people. And seeing it in action is a bit magical. The Google+ system is smart enough to focus on who is controlling the conversation at any point of time. This makes the conversation like a real world chat. It is as if the producer of the show knows which camera to switch to at the right time.

Google Hangout Screen

Another feature of Google+ is called “Huddle”. It’s essentially a group messaging app that works across Android, iPhone, and SMS to allow you to communicate with the people in certain Circles. In fact the Android world gets added benefit of one touch sharing on plus, with applications that let you share everything from photos to your game screens.

Google Huddle Feature

More Pluses

Apart from these highlighted features, there are many other utilities that Google + has, which are similar to any other social networking site. Like sharing photos through albums, adding links to your posts, videos, putting your location and giving thumbs up to a post you fancy by +1 button and the standard Google chat. But all these are done with small Google add on. Like in your albums, when you roll you mouse over an album, the photos fan out to show more. Also, an important feature being tested is tagging approvals.

Google Touch to Plus

There are many such little features that the early adopters of Google + are discovering every day. For some time that would be a fun task. This would give Google enough time to get the brand pages up and about, which as of now, is not allowed on Google +. A non individual profiles are not allowed by Google. Only MTV and Ford have profiles on Google + because they are their development partners, which shows, there is some loops that Google is thinking about for Brands as well.

Tags:Facebook, Features, Google, Plus, Social Media
Posted in Social Media, Social Media Marketing | 4 Comments »

Getting in line with the new Facebook Promotion Guidelines.

Friday, July 1st, 2011

In last one month, there has been a major development on Facebook. Brand pages in India have found their page disappear without any notice. Brands like Pizza Hut India, FCUK India, Cadbury Bournvillie and few others went missing for quite some time from Facebook. Apparently, the pages were not confirming to the promotion guidelines as stated by Facebook.

Not only has this made everyone sit up and go over their own pages, it has also highlighted the need to have the right people handling the brand pages. This incident is another instance which will necessitate companies to engage with established social media partners to manage their brands. As a continuous process of educating right social media, we bring to you the Facebook guidelines that the brands have to follow from here on, at least for now.

Simply Put

In its current format, the Facebook promotion guidelines simply bar any page to run a promotion campaign where you wish to select a winner via its page or the wall. This means brands are not allowed to collect entries in form of picture, videos or comments, conduct a draw, judge entries or notify winners through its mechanisms.

Avoid

In order to administer any kind of contest, you have to use an application or risk having Facebook come down on you. While liking the page and restricting the contest to the fans of the page is allowed, liking the contest entry or making it the only criteria to select a winner is not.

Ginger Hotel Contest Application

Nor can a winner be selected randomly to be given a prize, without any show of talent or ability. That would imply administrating a sweepstake, which is not allowed by Facebook. You cannot have a contest running which would make a purchase of a product a necessity to participate in a contest either.

A Sweepstake is not allowed

Also, you cannot contact winners inside Facebook at all—via email, chat or posting on their wall—nor can you post winners on your page wall. What you can do though is, select a fan at random and feature him or her in your page photo. Or possibly feature chosen fan(s) on a custom tab (link). As long as you don’t have other fans vote or submit nominations, etc. A good example of this is the current Toys R Us tab.

Featured Fan Profile Picture and Tab

Any predefined application of Facebook can also not be used for administrating any contest. This would mean, you cannot ask people to upload photos to a page album. You can have a photo gallery contest administered via a third party application.

Utilize

You CAN, although, provide a giveaway and even collect names and emails from fans and visitors to your page via a third party application and can be used develop an email management system. You can also use a piece of “fan only” reveal code to give away a coupon code or special gift to everyone who likes your page.

While it may seem that Facebook cannot possibly check each and every page to see if they adhere to promotion guidelines, it is not a risk worth taking. If the page does get pulled down, the PR disaster it will create is way greater than anything a brand would gain by flouting these guidelines.

Focus

Also, as much as people would like to believe that Facebook is trying to bully brands or promote application developers, this whole episode should only be seen as a reminder that promotions on Facebook is not about gaining numbers but building relationships via engagement, just like Facebook would want us to believe.

It also points to a more serious question of who should be allowed to handle the image of a brand like FCUK and other brands that suffered. People who are not aware of promotion guidelines, rules and regulations, agencies that pop up like wild mushrooms would only cause more grief.

A proper structure utilization and knowledge of the platform is a must for anyone handling the page. This is the time that the so called experts of social media will be separated from those who truly are evolving along with Facebook.

Tags:Applications, Brands, Contest, Facebook, Guidelines, Pages, Promotions
Posted in Brand Promotion, Facebook, Social Media, Social Media Marketing | No Comments »

An offer you cannot resist

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

By the time this post is up, Facebook would have already launched its next tool for world domination. Facebook Deals went live in 5 test market cities in USA on the night of 25th April 2011. With it, Facebook hopes, it will give 600 million users more reason to stay on Facebook even when they are outside or visiting a store.

What’s the deal?

Facebook Deals offers Facebook users’ access to Deals which are a steep discount to the actual price of the product. This is in addition to the earlier check-in based deals offer on Facebook Places. Now Facebook Deals will allow you to purchase a voucher on Facebook Deals itself and then redeeming it at the store. You can also check into a place and claim your discount using your phone application.

Each deal will have a separate landing page. Users can opt in to receive updates on their news feed about deals that are running close to their location. Once you spot the deal that you want, you can go to that deal page, like the deal, share the deal and/or purchase the deal right away using either a credit card or Facebook Credits. Once you have done so, you get a voucher that can then be used at the store.

A screenshot of a landing page for a Deal

Other than this, the old system of checking into a store and finding the available deals will also be retained in all likelihood. This will help Facebook not only target Groupon but also take on Foursquare through its Facebook Places application

Facebook Places Deal Application Screen

How should brands deal with it?

As a brand, this is another opportunity to reach out to your clients. Creating something that users can enjoy with their friends is something which gives maximum benefit of using Facebook as a marketing platform.

People like doing things with friends. Brands can use Deals on Facebook to offer people unique social experiences that they can share and enjoy together. Offering these experiences can bring more people to your business. Deals are a valuable new way to reach customers and build loyalty. Encourage people to share their excitement about the experience you’re providing, not just the discount you’re offering.

Why Deal with it?

For a start, Deals are going to be free as for now. Like any other Facebook offering, a free exposure to 600 million people is incentive enough to try it out. More so, it makes sense when you get the Facebook marketing team to push and promote your offer.

This will help in creating a buzz about your brand and more importantly, for the first time, offer direct sales opportunity via Facebook. All this time, when brands where wondering on how to gauge the ROI of Social Media Marketing, especially on Facebook , now is the time to cash in on the fan base and push deals.

Also, keep in mind the virality of the exposure your brand can get through this. Each person on Facebook has 130 friends on average, which means that if someone purchases a deal from you, that information can spread quickly and naturally on Facebook. Imagine if these 130 people share or buy your deal with their friends. These actions can help spread the word about your business to all of the friends of these 130 people through News Feed stories, Wall posts, and personal messages. And, because these stories are coming from a trusted network, people will be more likely to pay attention to what you’re offering.

Last but not least of all, use Deals to make your business a place where loyal customers bring their friends. Deals focuses on helping your business provide unique social experiences so that people are interested in what you have to offer, not just the discount you’re offering. Build long lasting relationships by offering people unique things to do with those that matter most in their lives.

Tags:Credits, Deals, Facebook, Foursquare, Groupon, Places, ROI
Posted in Brand Promotion, Facebook, Social Media, Social Media Marketing | No Comments »

Deconstructing the New Facebook Page

Tuesday, March 1st, 2011

Facebook has changed (upgraded, as they call it) the layout of its Pages once again and these changes will be rolled out all across Facebook by March end. With current set of changes, page owners now have more reach and better utility across the platform.

The Looks

The new Facebook page layout has changed to how the individual profile looks. This gives the page a sense of familiarity and helps in easier navigation.

Tabs

The tabs seem to have got lost in the new design evolution process, moved to the sidebar with smaller fonts from their earlier top of the page location. This might cause a significant drop in their visibility.

Benefits

Although the Tabs have been moved to the sidebar, the increased number of visible tabs along with longer tab names will help in communicating the exact nature and content of the same. This means that

In the previous version, only four tabs could be visible, while the others feel in a drop down box. But with the new setup, all the tabs can now be seen one below the other, therefore no tab gets lost.
Also, with name restriction of 15 characters no longer applied, tabs can now communicate exact message to the page viewer. Earlier, with this restrictions, a campaign tab had to have altered name to fit into the tab size and also to follow the guideline. But with no restriction on character limit, the tab name can now be as per the requirement.

The New Page layout

Photos and Post & Information Visibility

The recent photos get featured on the top of the page and the order of the visible photos can be edited. The most recent wall photos or photos that have the page tagged in them will appear here. This area will not include any photos posted by fans.

The other cosmetic changes that the page has been incorporated with are the ability to have the info section right on the top of the page, post selection criteria made to “Page” and “everyone” and a right hand sidebar that shows administrators and fans.

Benefits

Like all Facebook platforms, photos will become more vital and important in brand communication. Already, creative usage of this tool is being talked about. Also with the default setting of the posts being set as “everyone”, a lot more exposure to their posts.

The Works

More than anything else, the functionality changes that has happened with the new format has some real business implication. Brands are now in a position exploit their presence on the platform and reach out to as many of its 600 million users. Also, collaborating becomes easier along with the much touted “giving face to the brand” promise.

Exposure

One of the key features with the new Facebook Pages is that administrators of a page can switch back and forth between their personal profiles and essentially the profile of the Page. They can also leave comments on various Facebook platforms as the brand itself.

Benefits

This gives the page that much more opportunity to engage with audience, not just on their page, but also anywhere on Facebook, thereby increasing the exposure the page, and hence the brand, gets drastically. It can also mean, that the brand can engage in meaningful discussion on other pages, and direct the traffic from that page to their own, there by leading to in-organic growth.

Page Commenting Feature

Page Collaboration

With page commenting feature, opportunity for the pages to interact amongst each other come calling. Since the page can now like another page as it is, there is more possibility for mutual page promotion. Instead of “featured pages” these now comes us “likes.” Also, since a page has liked the other page, the news feed will be populated with the updates of the liked page when logged in as page on Facebook.

Benefits

This will help in crowd sourcing for relevant information. Page collaboration can help in establishing brand reputation by association. Also cross platform exposure for multi brand umbrella can also be contrived through page collaboration.

Page Collaboration

Notification

Being logged in as a page will help people to receive instant notification when people leave a comment on the page. With the new notification system in place, the page administrators will be alerted the second someone comments.

Benefits

This will eliminate the need to regularly check the page for updates and help in giving a quick response, making Customer Relation Management process much more efficient.

Instant Notification

Face behind the Page

The promise to make the brand more human is finally seeing the light of day with the changes that have been incorporated. With the feature to show who the administrators for the page are, the faceless page has now transformed to a more human personality. Finally the friend next door promise will become a real deal.

Benefits

The advantage of such a move will have to be weighed out over a period of time with a lot of brands treading a careful path since the administrators would want to safe guard their privacy, but as of now, the idea seems quite an inviting one, since a human personality associated with the page can make it appear much more approachable and also give the administrators the sense of recognition, there by promoting higher commitment towards the page.

Displaying the Page Administrator

The Overall Impact

The new Facebook changes have almost completely made every area of Facebook uniform. Also it has given the businesses a chance to be more vocal across the platform and hence in better control of the brand communication on Facebook.

Tags:Change, Collaboration, Customer Relation Management, Design, Facebook, Notification, Page, Photos, Social Media
Posted in Brand Promotion, Facebook, Social Media, Social Media Marketing | No Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Pages

Archives

Categories