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Social Media, Opt-In Marketing, and When Valuable Isn’t Enough

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Please!What would happen to your marketing programs if every channel required explicit opt-in and opting out or unsubscribing was just a click away?

Although it may seem absurd, this question is relevant today for two reasons:

  1. Congress continues to consider privacy legislation every year, and although not well understood, it is broadly supported by constituents. In need of popular support, this Congress may finally take on extensive privacy reform.
  2. More importantly, social media is much closer to an opt-in channel than email. On Twitter or G+, the difference between spam and consensual contact is much clearer than it ever has been in email. On Facebook, it is the only option.

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Email Marketing 2.0 is Facebook and More

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The Changes to Email Marketing will Not End with Facebook.

Jay Baer proposed in a blog post on Monday that Facebook for  Business is Email Marketing 2.0, and that email can then be used to value marketing efforts on Facebook. It is an excellent approach, and I think most comments missed the point. Facebook marketing and email marketing are both about developing an audience that allows you to engage over time.

Facebook is (part of) Email Marketing 2.0.

The most important part of the heading isn’t Facebook, it is Email 2.0. Both Facebook and email are used by companies to distribute information. But email marketing is a one-way blast channel.

Email Marketing 2.0 should look vastly different from today’s email marketing. With all due respect to the email providers integrating social sharing into email, that does not make email marketing a platform for sharing and discussing. It continues to be a one-way channel, at times simply promoting discussion or sharing elsewhere.

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Online is 77% Less Impactful than Newspaper

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This could be called a rant. And it briefly draws on basic economic theory. So unless you like rants based on forgotten college coursework, use the navigation or category links above to find another post. Otherwise, read on, and please share your thoughts below or with me on Twitter.

According to eMarketer’s Ad Dollars Still Not Following Online and Mobile Usage, on hour spent online drives 77% fewer advertising dollars than an hour spent with newspapers. Digital media proponents have been misled, believing somehow that time spent and budget should equalize. In reality, time and spend should never have been compared. Saying Online is 77% Less Impactful than Newspaper (like in this title) is just as accurate, and despite how ludicrous that statement may seem, is likely even more accurate than comparing time and budget.

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Facebook Is Bigger than the Numbers

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Facebook is set to pass Yahoo in 2011, capturing 21.6% of all US online display dollars, according to eMarketer. The number is impressive on its own, particularly since only two years ago, Facebook had developed a huge audience but still had almost no revenue to show for it.

However, 21.6% doesn’t tell the whole story. Facebook is even more important to marketers. Display ad revenue doesn’t capture the investment in community management, pages, content, even advertising in apps.

As a platform, an ecosystem and a media property, Facebook is now second only to Google in its importance to media and marketing.