Surfing the Infosphere

Marketing As We Know It is Dying

Facebook recently gave a presentation in Davos showing the ability to poll a specific segment of its users and receive an immediate response. This was talked about by ReadWriteWeb, Mashable, Techcrunch, and others as something that could be a part of Facebook’s efforts to build an engagement advertising platform.

There are many possibilities for how this platform might take shape but the bigger picture is that the reality of advertising truly becoming content is on the horizon.

This is often talked about in the case of Google where the majority of their revenue comes from small, targeted text ads served up in response to a user’s search. For the most part these ads are reasonably targeted and Google’s advertising system rewards targeted ads.

Applying this or the traditional model to social networks has been difficult because they are not quite content in the sense of an online version of a newspaper; nor are they search engines where the user is specifically looking for something. 

In many ways Facebook has become an essential component of their users life. A virtual coffee shop for friends to discuss and play games together. A place for flirtation. A place for business networking. A place for intellectuals to strut their stuff. In so many ways activities which would have happened “in real life” are happening now in the digital ether.

As this reality is changing the cultural and social mores it also has implications for how advertisers should engage their audience in this venue. 

Would we think it is kosher for an advertiser to interrupt a nice discussion over coffee with a racy advertisement on how we can get more action this Saturday night? Probably not. Then again, if we were having a kicking drink at the grimiest dive bar around it might be just the thing we are looking for.

The key is relevance to the person and relevance to the context. As Facebook and other social networks begin to understand not only more about their users but also about the contexts in which they live we will begin to see advertisements that are genuinely useful.  

An ad telling me to check out Artist X, who was cited by My Favorite Band as one of their top influences, while I am checking out My Favorite Band is not an ad -- it’s a good tip.