Archive for August 27, 2010

U.S. adults ages 50 and up who use the Internet are flocking to social networks, according to the results of a survey of 2,252 adults ages 18+ by Princeton Survey Research Associates on behalf of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The survey provides more evidence suggesting social media could become an effective advertising and marketing platform for reaching older Internet users (chronic offense-takers, please note that I did not write “old people”).

The Pew findings are pretty dramatic: Among Internet users ages 50+ overall, social network use increased from 22% in April 2009 to 42% in May 2010. To boot, 10% of the 50+ cohort uses Twitter or a similar “status update” service, either to post updates or check other people’s updates.

Looking at specific age cohorts, social network use among Internet users ages 50-64 surged from 25% to 47%, with 20% of this group saying they check into social networks on a daily basis — up from 10% last year. Meanwhile the proportion of Internet users ages 65+ using social networks doubled from 13% to 26% over this period, with the number checking in daily jumping from 4% to 13%.

By contrast, social network use among Internet users ages 18-29 appears to be reaching saturation, growing from 76% in April 2009 to 86% in May 2010.

These findings seem to jibe with some other figures Erik wrote about recently, suggesting that the overall rate of growth in social networks is slowing, but that growth could continue if social networks penetrate certain under-utilizing parts of the population — especially older adults. The pool of potential users is growing rapidly: a separate study from Pew found that the proportion of Americans ages 70-75 who were online increased from 26% in 2005 to 45% in 2009.

via [Mediapost]

StarHub tasked Vocanic to come up with a social media activation that would help spread the word about their Broadband and compliment their ATL campaign.

This campaign centred upon 8 key reasons why StarHub Broadband is the leading Broadband service in Singapore and why it should be the choice of every consumer.

We created an engagement that would be accessed on Facebook via the StarHub Facebook Fanpage that would at the same time entertain and remind people of the 8 key reasons to use MaxOnline.

The activation was a “memory matching” game that would be simple but effective.

The game would require users to match 8 pairs of tiles, each designed with one of the 8 reasons and icons on them.

Each attempt would be timed and the top 20 competitors with the fastest timings would be pooled into a draw where 1 lucky winner would walk away with a Limited Edition HP Mini by Studio Tord Boontje.

A leaderboard was made for competitors to keep tabs on their positions in the top 20.

After completing their matching attempt, competitors are given the option to either submit their timing, or play again to better their previous score.

Each submission is accompanied with a Post to Wall function that would showcase the game to all their contacts, and a Challenge Your Friends option.

Both these were added to give the game more online visiblity and support StarHub’s 8 Reasons MaxOnline campaign.

As the main broadcast sponsor for the inaugural Youth Olympic Games held in Singapore, StarHub asked Vocanic to create an activation that would be engaging to youth and promote attendance at YOG events.

Using a combination of Facebook and FourSquare as the primary platforms, we developed an activation that would reward people for attending YOG events whilst at the same time, promote the contest and YOG on their social networks.

After registering  on a Facebook application on StarHub’s fan page, participants would check-in to specific YOG stadiums and sports halls when they were attending a YOG event. Each check-in would have to be accompanied by a Shout Out saying “I’m supporting YOG with StarHub!”

At the end of the Youth Olympic Games, from the list of Top 20 Check-ins, 6 winners would be selected to win a Samsung Galaxy Beam, 2 Samsung Waves and a set of Limited Edition Youth Olympic Games Memorabilia.

With this activation, StarHub has become the first Telco in Singapore and joins the increasing number of brands to use FourSquare to engage their customers.

Delegates and guest speakers at the 2010 London Net Promoter conference share their views on Net Promoter in this short video.

Usually, new vehicles are unveiled at big marquee auto shows in places like Detroit and L.A. But Ford seems to have done well to launch its Explorer crossover virtually, on social media.

The reveal’s physical occurrence was in the middle of New York City, on a faux hillside right in front of Macy’s. But Jumpstart Media, a Hachette Filipacchi-owned network of auto-centric Web sites, says the real jaw-dropper may have happened online.

The firm says the reveal of the 2011 Ford Explorer on Facebook caused a 104% increase in the number of people going to Ford Explorer pages in Jumpstart’s network of Web sites on July 26, the day of the unveiling.

Ford took the unusual tack of unveiling the vehicle on Facebook, and subsequently doubled the daily users researching Ford Explorer across Jumpstart’s online automotive shopping and enthusiast properties, compared to the average daily usage for the month of July, per the firm.

Jumpstart says the boom continued with successive daily improvements in usage versus the average, of 66%, 25%, 13% and 8% by July 30.

The firm says that because of engagement during the Facebook reveal, Ford got a greater share of SUV shoppers across Jumpstart’s 13 automotive shopping and enthusiast Web sites, including Vehix, Consumer Guide Automotive, JD Power Autos, Shopping.com Autos, Car and Driver, Road & Track, and U.S.News.com. The network says Ford’s share of SUV shoppers grew by 52% on the day of the unveiling to become the most-researched SUV.

Joe Kyriakoza, VP of marketing communications at Jumpstart, said in a release that the Facebook effort managed to encourage a high volume of in-market shoppers to consider Explorer. Kyriakoza says that after trailing Grand Cherokee — which also recently launched a new design for 2011 — for most of July, Explorer soared ahead of it and the rest of the competition for the remainder of the month.

Jumpstart also said the Explorer Facebook reveal did better than Super Bowl ads for other automakers. Ford outdistanced other automakers’ share-of-shopping increases the day after they had run 30-second Super Bowl commercials this year. The firm says Super Bowl auto advertisers saw average share of shopping lift by 14%. But that was less than a third of Explorer’s growth from the Facebook unveiling.

“While it’s unclear what Ford paid for the Facebook reveal, I’m confident it was nowhere near the cost of even one $2.5 million Super Bowl commercial,” said Kyriakoza. “Ford’s campaign clearly demonstrates that while traditional media can be highly effective in driving consideration, a well-executed and deeply influential online program can shift car shopping intent with immediacy and efficacy.”

via [Mediapost]