Mar
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4th
And another to check things out
Today your customers want to DO things, not BUY things; they want to listen to EACH OTHER; not you; and they want to ADAPT your brand to make it their OWN. FANS AND LIKES: OFTEN MEANINGLESS (OR ONLY FLEETINGLY MEANINGFUL) 
On Facebook, anyone can glean public-facing information on fans and “likes” — so those figures are widely touted and cited. But consider the current Top 10 list of Facebook fans for brands, as monitored by Facebook-analytics company Socialbakers of Pilsen, in the Czech Republic. (The company offers enterprise-level tracking to clients around the world including BMW and HP; see analytics.socialbakers.com for details.) Source: Socialbakers
Coca-Cola, Starbucks and Disney top the list of numbers of fans — not particularly surprising. But it doesn’t take long for the chart to devolve into Pavlovian fanboy territory. Picture, if you will, the demographic that washes down Skittles and Oreos with Red Bull while checking out Victoria’s Secret model galleries. Converse appears twice on the list (thanks to the Converse All Star shoe getting its own fan page) — and, actually, Victoria’s Secret also makes a second appearance, with its Pink sub-brand showing up just beyond the Top 10, in the No. 17 spot. The top 25, in case you’re curious, is rounded out by the likes of Pringles, PlayStation, Monster Energy, Starburst, Nutella and Xbox, which should tell you something. The truth is, many of the most-fanned (i.e., most-liked) brands on Facebook are already beloved by the “like”-prone nerd set — a teen/collegiate demographic that can be both easily engaged and instantaneously distracted. Another way of saying “easily engaged”: easily induced. Take, for instance, Skittles, which has been growing its Facebook fan base with goofy promotions including, recently, a give-away of a full-size Skittles vending machine (perfect for your dorm room!). Skittles may well be iconic (and yummy) enough to deserve every one of its 15 million fans, but from a consumer perspective, going public about your Skittles love (or jones for Nutella or addiction to Monster Energy) is most likely incentive-induced behavior. Quite simply, the affection (“like” or fandom) being expressed is most often just a brief manifestation of desire for a prize, a discount or a fleeting bit of amusement. (Too bad there’s no “Like for the next five minutes only” button.) Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s worth remembering that much of the heat in the fan/”like” space is driven by very old-fashioned marketing concepts. Source: http://adage.com/article/digital/metrics-mess-sad-truths-online-measurement/149055/
Coca-Cola, Starbucks and Disney top the list of numbers of fans — not particularly surprising. But it doesn’t take long for the chart to devolve into Pavlovian fanboy territory. Picture, if you will, the demographic that washes down Skittles and Oreos with Red Bull while checking out Victoria’s Secret model galleries. Converse appears twice on the list (thanks to the Converse All Star shoe getting its own fan page) — and, actually, Victoria’s Secret also makes a second appearance, with its Pink sub-brand showing up just beyond the Top 10, in the No. 17 spot. The top 25, in case you’re curious, is rounded out by the likes of Pringles, PlayStation, Monster Energy, Starburst, Nutella and Xbox, which should tell you something. The truth is, many of the most-fanned (i.e., most-liked) brands on Facebook are already beloved by the “like”-prone nerd set — a teen/collegiate demographic that can be both easily engaged and instantaneously distracted. Another way of saying “easily engaged”: easily induced. Take, for instance, Skittles, which has been growing its Facebook fan base with goofy promotions including, recently, a give-away of a full-size Skittles vending machine (perfect for your dorm room!). Skittles may well be iconic (and yummy) enough to deserve every one of its 15 million fans, but from a consumer perspective, going public about your Skittles love (or jones for Nutella or addiction to Monster Energy) is most likely incentive-induced behavior. Quite simply, the affection (“like” or fandom) being expressed is most often just a brief manifestation of desire for a prize, a discount or a fleeting bit of amusement. (Too bad there’s no “Like for the next five minutes only” button.) Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s worth remembering that much of the heat in the fan/”like” space is driven by very old-fashioned marketing concepts. Source: http://adage.com/article/digital/metrics-mess-sad-truths-online-measurement/149055/
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