comScore Ad Metrix is reporting today on the relative frequency of ads appearing on MySpace pages versus the relative frequency of ads appearing on Facebook. While MySpace had twice as many unique visitors (68.4 million) than Facebook in September, they served six times as many ads. That’s leading some to suggest that Facebook has lots of room to run more ads on their pages.

What that ignores, however, is the brand damage that could do to Facebook, which is already reeling from a backlash over their Beacon program, which they recently adjusted.

Remember, Facebook’s “brand” is clean and pure. MySpace’s brand is the wild, wild west, so the ads are just another part of the chaos—along with hideously ugly templates that some people choose.

Facebook continues to grow nicely (129% growth over September 06), particularly relative to MySpace (23% growth), but right now MySpace is winning the battle to monetize their traffic, and Facebook hasn’t yet found that answer.  The multi-billion question is if they ever will.

Here’s the projected growth of advertising on social networks through 2011. (I love eMarketer, by the way… Great info from those guys…)

A friend of mine showed me this video by Rhett and Link and I couldn’t help but to share it with you. For those of you unfamiliar with Facebook, it actually gives a little overview of how it works too…. My favorite part about the video? The recorder solo…

With mine and Jim’s previous posts about Wal-Mart’s missteps in social media, I couldn’t resist the temptation to share a little about Target, who has recently been caught as it is learning its lesson on transparency and disclosure.

To get a feel for what happened, you may want to read this article by Jackie Crosby over at the Star Tribune which gives a pretty good encapsulation of what happened. Basically, to put it in a nutshell, Target reached out to a group called “The Rounders” ( a group of students who receive discounts and products from Target to share with friends and to provide feedback) to promote its Facebook page.

This in and of itself is a valid effort – reaching out to advocates and promoting other social media efforts is always a smart move in my opinion (after all – that’s how Jim gets Facebook friends…). However, Target decided to tamper with the lines of transparency within social media and specifically encourage these Rounders not to disclose their affiliation with the program.

In fact, according to the Star Tribune article, the newsletter sent to this group stated the following:

“Your Mission: Try not to let on in the Facebook group that you are a Rounder,”

“We love your enthusiasm for the Rounders, and I know it can be hard not to want to sing it from the mountaintops [and in the shower, and on the bus]. However, we want to get other members of the Facebook group excited about Target, too! And we don’t want the Rounders program to steal the show from the real star here: Target and Target’s rockin’ Facebook group. So keep it like a secret!”

From this messaging, Rounder Rosie Siman (who I now want to hire by the way), posted her personal concerns of this request on Facebook – a concern regarding the ethics of asking paid/compensated advocates to specifically hide this information in a fan-related forum.

From there, after Siman’s posts were mysteriously archived/deleted, Target was forced to play a typical corporate crisis communication plan of action – including displacing blame to other affiliated parties and vendors, making vague corporate statements, and making it seem like they had no idea of how something like this happened. Target’s response was as follows:

“An e-mail from a company employee, identifying herself only as Laura, told Siman that her concerns “were completely founded” and that the newsletter urging Rounder members to stay anonymous “was not endorsed by Target.”

“Clearly it was a mistake from this vendor, and that’s why they did the follow-up,” said Target spokeswoman Amy VonWalter. Target’s intent, VonWalter said, was not to ask Rounder members to hide their affiliation, but to discourage them from dominating the Facebook site and making it feel like an exclusive, members-only club.

Now – I’m not sure either if Target wrote this newsletter or it’s vendor – or the exact details to how something like this happened- but it blows my mind how 1) a company like Target can claim that something clearly branded to their advocates is “not endorsed” by their company (in my world if you farm something out you are ultimately responsible for it) and 2) how whoever was responsible didn’t think that “it’s our little secret” sounds outright sketchy and unethical and 3) how large companies like Target and Wal-Mart haven’t hired a dedicated social media agency.

That’s all I’ve got to say. If anybody has answers to this please let me know!

E-marketer delivered a Forester study today that showed that 92% of young mobile users in certain European countries report sending SMS text messages on their phone. 62% report sending MMS (multi-media) messages on their phone. But only 21% report using their phone to send or receive email.

What’s this have to do with social media marketing and why is a social media agency sharing the information?

While we’re all working to figure out social media marketing and how it’s going to work, there’s a pretty big platform change racing toward us. With PC sales declining in Japan already (and the rest of the world ahead of the U.S. in mobile technology), we need to keep in the back of our mind that much of this is going to port to the small screen, potentially fairly soon.

And as ad models evolve, fitting meaningful (to both the consumer and the marketer) ads on the small screen is a challenge that needs to be solved. More likely, in my view, is that someone smart will find a way to give away packages of SMS messages in exchange for sponsorships.

But, social media marketers, let’s keep the cell phone future in your thoughts as we move forward. Facebook has going mobile web (picture below from this article on CrunchGear). Everyone will eventually go mobile. How does that impact your social media marketing plans?

In my work here at a social media agency, I’ve been noticing recurring trends in false perceptions and misconceptions of social media and social media marketing from new prospects and clients alike. As a result, I decided to clear things up with some good ol’ fashioned myth busting.

1. “Social Media is free.”

- True. Most of the social media tools are in fact free to use. So why is there cost involved with social media marketing? Just like in PR, you pay for the time and expertise of staff to brand, promote, and develop quality content. While some companies are hesitant to pay for a social media agency, often times this will save the company internal resources and provide them with strategy, direction, and results. Just because it is free doesn’t always mean effective.

2. “Social Media gives ideas and content away that you should charge for.”

- False. To put it quite simply – the more you give, the more you will receive in social media. Quit thinking that everything you produce is proprietary. In social media, if you want to be the “expert,” you must prove it.

3. “We can create a Viral Campaign for you – NOW!”

– False. Organic viral is difficult to promise or replicate. Why? Because the results are ultimately in the hands of the audience and a number of other variables. While we can design a strategic campaign to incite numerous conversations, we cannot ultimately control the splash it will have. Beware of agencies that promise this.

4. “There is no measurable ROI of Social Media.”

– False. While this is topic is still a debate among the social media community and marketers – this is undebatable to me. If anything – social media has shown huge ROI through increased search engine optimization alone – for Ignite this has resulted in higher organic search results. What has this translated to? A quantifiable number of new business leads, in addition to brand positioning that lets us into the conversations of our target audience.

5. “Social Media is for Tweens, Teens, and Twenty-Somethings”

- False. Contrary to the perception that social media is for the “kids”, older demographics are evolving into this space rapidly. Take a look at this past year – LinkedIn made a storm through corporate America, niche networking sites like CafeMom have exploded, and according to BusinessWeek, Facebook’s 35-and-up crowd now accounts for more than 41 percent of all Facebook visitors (after all, if Jim is getting friends his own age).

6. “Social networking will replace networking”

– False. As my new Twitter friend Peter Shankman noted, “Social networking is not going to replace networking. Only complement it.” If you want to be a successful networker in your business and personal life – you must use the two together.

7. “Social media isn’t really work.”

– False. Merely throwing up a blog isn’t going to get you traffic and merely writing about things that pop into your head isn’t likely going to make you an authority on anything. Regardless of what the common attitude is, it takes work to get results.

8. “Social Media is a Fad.”

– False. This past year, the popularity of social media has been everywhere – resulting in a “buzz” that many marketers are remaining skeptical about . In fact, many are hesitating to expend resources or budgets in what appears to be another fad. But yet, social media is obviously more than this, when it is understood. It is a fundamental shift in communication – it isn’t just new “tools”, but new ways of networking, communicating, organizing, and living. It is becoming intertwined in lifestyles – which means it is here to stay.

9. “Blogging is too scary.”

– False. Many companies are scared to death of blogging for fear of negative reactions or simply “messing up”. They are quite surprised when I tell them that 1) Comments can be monitored to filter out spam and trash from the “valuable” negative comments and can be a helpful way to hear customer feedback; and 2) the social media community is open, honest, and more forgiving than they think. Even companies that have bellyflopped into social media (ex. Jet Blue and Dell) have recovered by admitting mistakes and moving on.

10. “Social Media Marketing is placing Ads on Facebook.”

– False. I can’t stress this enough – but placing banner ads on Facebook is not equivalent to social media marketing. It’s advertising and it always will be.

Can you think of any more social media or social media marketing myths out there that need to be cleared up? I’d love to hear them!

Nathania Johnson recently tagged me to respond in her post “A Meme about Measuring Social Media Marketing” – asking me to answer the question that is plaguing us all these days regarding the best way to measure social media marketing.

This isn’t the first time that this should be asked, nor shall it be the last (at least I hope). After all, measurement boils down to making sure that money is well spent, audiences are reached, and determining tactics that worked versus those that didn’t. This valuable information should always be at the forefront of a social media marketing campaign.

And yet, unfortunately, I’m afraid that I can’t provide an answer that is a “one size fits all” recommendation- because quite simply one does not exist, nor should it. Instead, I agree with Sam Harrelson’s response that the measurement of social media marketing should be tailored to the business model of the particular company, and I will add to this that in order to measure, a company’s social media marketing objectives must be clearly defined.

Undefined social media marketing objectives are basically blogging just to “start a blog”, or having a Facebook group page to “have a Facebook group page”. Companies that employ this “strategy” going into their social media marketing campaign will likely find it nearly impossible to quantify or measure its success. However, if objectives are set from the beginning, measurement is much clearer and easier to quantify.

Objectives should be inspired from the needs of the company. If an e-commerce company wants to start a blog about “product reviews”, then it should measure the funnel of traffic from the blog to the e-commerce site. Through that, the site should further analyze the percentage of products purchased from this segment, and analyze the value of these purchases against other methods of entry.

To give another example I’ll use Ignite. One of our objectives of this blog is to ultimately to gain more clients and further expand our network in this space. With this clearly stated, we track the source of all business leads, so we can quantify the number that are a result of our blog and the quality of those leads. To measure our network, we monitor and track comments, trackbacks, and the social network activities that we are involved in.

Hope this gives a snapshot of how setting objectives in social media marketing can actually determine the particular tactics of social media measurement. If anybody has a specific question or anything to add, feel free.

“Use Facebook to share pictures of yourself using our product and we’ll give the winner a trip for five to Cancun.”

Ok, not a bad idea. Fun enough. Innocent enough. Unless, that is, you’re Molson beer and colleges in Canada get really irked that you’re encouraging irresponsible drinking. So maybe the colleges are a bit oversensitive, but you play the good corporate citizen card, punt and pull the contest.

I mean, it’s not like Molson encourages Canadian college kids to drink their beer, right? (Pay no attention to the actual Molson ad below…) But in Molson’s defense, isn’t the drinking age in Canada aligned almost perfectly with freshman year??

It’s the holiday’s right? A time for merrily buying Christmas gifts, Hanukkah gifts, Kwanzaa gifts (and, if you’re wondering, time for buying MY birthday present—the 29th of December, write it down…).

Imagine this scenario. A Facebook member, you buy a nice pair of leather gloves from Overstock.com for your boyfriend for Hanukkah. A while later, poof, your choice is sent out in your news feed—a feed that broadcasts to all your friends, including er, um, that boyfriend. Dang!

That’s exactly what happened to Matthew Helfgott’s girlfriend, he says. Another couple had their choice of movie broadcast on their feed because they bought the tickets at Fandango. This was ok, they said, because they were seeing “No Country for Old Men.” But here’s the best line of the article:

“What if I was seeing ‘Fred Claus’? That would have been much more embarrassing. At least this was a prestigious movie.”

While his reaction is funny, people are starting to see why Facebook’s new advertising platform is named “Beacon” (see definition of beacon if you don’t get that).  Many bloggers are unhappy about it. Link 1. Link 2. Link 3.  And it can send news about things you do away from Facebook to your Facebook friends.

“Add 3 lines of code and reach millions of users,” Facebook says.

As someone who runs a social media agency, I love this idea.  What an opportunity to market on a social media platform.  What a great way to let the confidence of a friend influence buying decisions.  This should be powerful stuff.

But as someone who believes that social media marketing is more than being about a new place to run ads, I think this solution was a little too easy for Facebook.  I believe they rushed it out to capitalize on their otherwise great momentum and to prove to people that they could monetize their success.

What this backlash may be showing, however, is just how hard it will be for Facebook to ever monetize their success to the point that they can justify their current valuation.  They may yet figure it out, as they’ve done a lot right.  But if the Beacon backlash continues, it could be seriously brand damaging for Facebook.  I think this is the first of many mainstream articles about unintended consequences.

Here’s a prediction: A boss somewhere is going to notice on a news feed some purchases by his co-worker that align with times he was supposed to be working.  Watch for that article.  Just like that intern who got Facebook-busted for the Halloween party, and he didn’t have a Beacon shouting about it…

What do you think? Is Beacon the opening that social media agencies and social media marketers have been looking for? Or is a fairly significant mistake by Facebook that needs to be tweaked?

We held the initial meeting of the Social Media Club of the Triangle in our offices back on November 14. Of course, it took me until I had some down time to upload the video and cut it up a bit. I’ll admit, I was more than a bit lazy with my editing (hey, I ate a lot of turkey this weekend, so sue me…), but at least you can get a sense of the event.

Thanks to all who attended. Watch for updates for future meetings here or, if you wanted to be added to the list to get them by email, just leave us a comment.

In the spirit of the season – we’ve compiled a few things we are thankful for around here at Ignite.

As always, feel free to add to the list :-)

Enjoy!

1. The “music genome project” Pandora. Without it, Lisa’s musical taste would suffer more than it already does.
2. We are all thankful for Gene’s glorious dreds, being able to capture this picture, and his fluency in coding languages.
3. Jim is thankful for people over 40 who join Facebook, people who don’t giggle when he says Twitter, and his small but growing number of Facebook friends, LinkedIn connections, Twitter followers and followees, Plaxo connections, Digg fans, and most of all, people who link back to us. (On a side note – Lisa is amazed at how unabashedly Jim has started shilling for new online friends with link lists like this and will be thankful when he gets stalkers.)
4. Common Craft, who consistently break things down in creative, comprehensible ways and for creating helpful videos like this.
5. Feedburner and Google Analytics. These have provided us with hours of free entertainment.
6. Clients who “get” it, or come to us in order to “get it”.
7. Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger for writing Cluetrain Manifesto.
8. A good Technorati “Authority” rating, that puts the Ignite blog ahead of 99.825039% of all blogs in the world. (Not that we’re counting or anything….)
9. Blogs like ExperienceCurve, Glen Allsopp over at at ViperChill, and Enterprise 2.0’s FastForwardBlog.
10. Blendtec. For being brave enough to blend an iphone, a rake, and a can of Easy Cheese – and for proving the power of social media marketing.

On a final note, we’d like to thank all of you for reading, commenting, linking, and doing what you do. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.