‘Top advertisers understand that social is not a game of likes and followers anymore’ says Nobox CEO | M&M Global

‘Top advertisers understand that social is not a game of likes and followers anymore’ says Nobox CEO

Carlos Garcia, CEO of Nobox explains how our real identities in social networks combined with targeting by interest, location, device and first-party data have unlocked one of the most powerful digital marketing platforms to date.

Nobox

The biggest contribution that social has made to advertising in 2014 has been to enable the most precise targeting at scale. Our real identities in social networks combined with targeting by interest, location, device and first-party data have unlocked one of the most powerful digital marketing platforms to date.

In many ways, the recent innovation and efficiencies in programmatic media buying were inspired by the audience targeting opportunities that social brought to advertisers. Together, these platforms will minimise, and sometimes obliterate, media waste.

Top advertisers understand that this is not a game of likes and followers anymore. Now, “social” is very much about direct response and achieving relevant reach at scale to fill the top of the funnel, elevate the brand, or both. Social media’s original value proposition still remains after this transformation; connecting people and people with brands on a personal level, thus enabling human-to-human marketing at its best.

Harnessing the power of social sharing

Netflix and GoPro are masters of harnessing the power of social sharing and engagement and then amplifying the best content to maximise reach and achieve their business and branding goals.

Marriott leverages technology to engage social media influencers at a hyper-local and personal level. By doing so, they capture the power of human-to-human marketing at their properties around the world.

The agility of these players to test, measure, optimise and scale the latest social marketing technologies sets them apart from their competition.

The relevance of social

By 2015, leading brands will fully embrace the meaning of social into their holistic marketing strategy and stop using the term as a buzzword or just another touchpoint with the consumer. Social insights will permeate and influence every stage of the advertising cycle; from research and planning to execution and amplification, and ultimately, success metrics.

The role of social in advertising is directly connected to the authenticity of a brand. Particularly for brands targeting Millennials, the relevance of “social” has transcended from the silos of Facebook fan pages Twitter profiles to become an integral dimension of the most successful campaigns. We can see this more clearly on the content side of their advertising campaigns; from user-generated TV spots, influencer campaigns on Instagram and Vine, promoted tweets from actual brand ambassadors, it is clear that the brands that win the hearts and wallets of Generation-Y are marketing with them not just at them. In a nutshell, the importance of social media is the difference between being relevant or not.

Social will prosper in LatAm

Latin America and more specifically, Brazil and Mexico will be the fastest growing markets for social for the foreseeable future. Here is why – Brazil and Mexico have some of the youngest populations of Internet users in the world. In both countries, Internet penetration is still growing by double digits per year and smartphone penetration is growing over 30% per year. As a result, 94% of all Internet users in these countries have active profiles in social networks; compared to 67% in the US. Consider that while the bulk of Internet users in the US became users in the age of AOL and Yahoo!, the Latin American Internet user grew up with Facebook and Twitter and maybe Orkut if you were in Brazil a few years ago.

Currently, Instagram has more users in Latin America than in the US. Not only that, it is growing faster in Mexico and Brazil than anywhere in the world.

 

The dominant social networks are losing their edge regarding organic reach. It used to be that engaging a user in a social network had a significant multiplying effect. The effective CPA is still much lower when you orchestrate earned, owned and paid media, but this is concerning. It is undeniable that the effect that Wall Street is having on the social networks is counter productive for users and ultimately for brands.

For much more analysis of the biggest trends shaping global media and marketing, order your FREE copy of M&M Global presents: International Media 2015 here

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