Social Media - The Following Great Advertising Channel?

With so much interest in how social networks function, one begins to wonder when there is marketing potential within these social networks?

I've been watching social media for some time now. Actually I am a part of various social networking sites including http://www.myspace.com/ and https://www.linkedin.com only...

There's been a virtual explosion of social networking websites in the past few years. Even the people like Google, Yahoo and MSN are getting into it.

With therefore much interest in how social networks function, one begins to wonder if you have marketing potential within these social networks?

I have been watching social media for quite a while now. In fact I am a part of various social networking websites including http://www.myspace.com/ and https://www.linkedin.com merely to name two.

I joined partly because I wished to see what they were, but more importantly to see on SEM what effect social media could have in-the coming years.

I've been a part of numerous ser-vices for some time and the reach these sites have is extraordinary.

For instance, from my LinkedIn network of eight people I've an extended network of over 12,600 people.

That is amazing - I'm merely a click or two away from close to 13,000 others who share my related interests ranging from what I like to watch o-n TV to work I can give for them. For another interpretation, people are able to check-out: http://ebay.com/bhp/lia-sophia.

Through my connections and their connections, I'm connected to people including the American Cancer Society, to Sun Microsystems to the University of Texas to Google.

But what marketing possibilities exist for Social Networking?

Well, let's take a look at MySpace. To explore more, consider checking out: http://www.ebay.com/bhp/lia-sophia.

MySpace is one of many prime sites on the Web today. It racked up 9.4 billion page-views in August 2005 (significantly more than Google) and new customers are signing up in a mind-boggling rate of 3.5 million per month.

MySpace is typical of where todays 18-30 year old visits manage their digital life. It allows users to post pictures of themselves and their friends, develop a weblog, list a common artists, watch and share videos, suggest things to do and lists a set of people they consider friends. It's with this 'Friends List' where a lot of the opportunities lie.

All forty million-plus customers of MySpace possess a friends site that lists people that person considers their friend. This really is a set of individuals who they're interested in conversing with and about, along with hearing from on a regular basis. They can send you emails, discuss your photos, study your websites, as well as abandon messages that you can then tell the others after you add somebody as your friend. This is an opportunity for immediate feedback about you.

The capacity to add friends to your site is key for marketing to MySpace consumers. According to Courtney Holt, mind of new media and strategic advertising at Interscope Records, 'This technology is growing up without having ever observed programmed media. 'They do not think in terms of the record, and they do not think in terms of a TV schedule. They think in terms of TiVo, P2P, AOL, and needless to say MySpace.

You can see how this may grow. If you are interested in data, you will certainly choose to read about in english.

Let us say you produce a MySpace account to fairly share your service or product. You website about it and look for your interests that may be shared by others.

You then invite them to be your friend. When they become a friend you begin your 'gentle market' pitching your solution for them.

As they grow to understand it, they start blogging and discussing it. Quickly thousands or even thousand of people are referring to you and your product or service.

Don't think this can work?

I would like to give some situations to you. There are numerous artists who have gotten their start MySpace. By just hosting a few of their music on the web and blogging about them-selves they developed a following. Soon they'd record deals and contracts lined up.

Obviously to make use of ser-vices like MySpace you need to get some thing this target audience needs. If you do not then you probably should not put too much effort in to MySpace.

But that will not mean other social-networking opportunities ought to be overlooked. Linked-in is more of an expert introduction service, as i stated earlier. If your product or service fits here then by all means examine it further.

And there are others aswell. Services for example Flickr, Yahoo!s MyWeb, http://del.icio.us and more.

If you have ever wondered what other online opportunities may be around, consider social networking. It could be another great website marketing channel..

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