ASIA-PACIFIC, SEPTEMBER 15, 2011: adobo magazine asks Matt Sutton, CEO of the Singapore-based digital media company Aktiv Digital about social media, from apps and games to videos and ROI.
What makes Asia-Pacific ripe for social ad campaigns?
Social media is the biggest communication revolution since the internet itself. There are now more than a billion people on the internet globally and over half of those are on Facebook. And Asia is no exception. 20% of that Facebook audience are in SEA – that’s just under 100 million active users! Nielsen reports that users spend up to three times more time on Facebook than they do on portals. The existence of re-sellers that understand the space is also critical. By working with the right re-seller, advertisers can engage huge numbers of highly targeted audiences with video, recruit highly targeted consumers to attach themselves to a brand, and create dialogue with those consumers with quality content.
What does social media do best?
Buzz word alert: it’s all about engagement. Social media gives advertisers the opportunity to create consistent and on-going dialogues with their consumers. The metrics are different from ‘traditional online’ (banners) and revolve around the number of engagements advertisers drive with consumers and the lifetime customer value you generate through the creation of these brand advocates.
What are the latest developments in Facebook apps?
Two things: apps built for advertisers’ own pages that engage fans and drive brand advocacy, and the onset of extremely unique advertising opportunities within the apps and games that Facebook users are deploying. Savvy advertisers working with a skilled re-seller can run near full page video executions within social media environments as well as have apps built specifically for them to engage their own fans.
What are the different ways brands can get into social gaming?
Social gaming delivers some of the most engaged online environments that exist on the world wide web. It’s the ultimate ‘pull’ media. Opportunities range from recruiting engaged users to engage with your own brand to running bespoke video and rich media banners to extremely targeted sections of these users to get very cost-effective and engaged consumption of your advertising assets. At the other end of the scale, why not have a branded game created specifically for your social media ‘fans’?
Can you share with us the best-performing campaigns you have worked on?
At Aktiv, we offer a full suite social solution across all of these elements so campaigns are broad-ranging. Some major highlights would be video banner running across apps and games on Facebook on a cost-per-engagement basis for Coca Cola – the demographic targeting and reach and frequency benefits far outstrip those of TV. Taking cash from television by running TVCs online is how we’ll drive major growth in this industry over the next few years and social has a big part to play here. Another great campaign saw Burger King’s TVC virally distributed across the social media and blogger engagement with consumption of the video charged on a guaranteed basis. The video surpassed all guaranteed engagements resulting in a further 130,000 views of the video.
Aside from views, how is engagement measured on YouTube?
There is a mass of data that can be collected here and this is critical to understanding the success of a campaign. These include cross-pollination in terms of the video going viral to other friends on YouTube and other platforms; and tracking the comments and feedback from those users who have consumed the video as well as the more straight forward likes, dislikes and favorites. In addition, we can track the demographics of those sharing and consuming the video to understand which cross section of the online population are most attracted and engaged. We have licensed technology platforms in place to track and report all of these when you book a social video campaign with us.
What insights are important to keep in mind when developing campaigns for the Philippine audience?
For a start, Filipinos are ‘very’ social. More than 25 million users make Facebook the number one website in the Philippines and in terms of share of the online population. This means Facebook is more popular in the Philippines than anywhere else. That’s a huge take-up considering the hold on the market Multiply used to have. A cursory glance at the internet usage habits within the Philippines will find entertainment and video right at the top in terms of the amount of visits and time Filipinos spend on this type of content. Within the social environment it’s all about the quality of the content and the content of the dialogue. Social is a medium that gives you the opportunity to create a buzz but it won’t create the buzz for you – media is critical and content is king.
How do you measure ROI for social?
Social marketing is continuous rather than episodic. Yes, there will be campaigns aimed at achieving some short-term results but the focus should really be nurturing the on-going relationship with consumers. Social media efforts need to be evaluated over a period of time. The metrics used to measure social ROI are being adapted from the last generation of digital advertising. To be able to measure the true value of a social campaign we need to first arrive at new metrics that understand the breadth and depth of social media marketing. With this in mind, it’s important to work with a re-seller that can define these metrics with you beforehand and provide the technology to track and report them to fully understand your ROI.
In your experience, how does owned media lead to earned media?
As social media advertising matures, paid media will become a key tool for marketers to overcome social media clutter. Social media marketing should create a fusion strategy combining owned, earned, and paid tactics to increase attention and engagement. Simply buying impressions is not enough but it can be a starting point in a strategy to create more earned media.
Are there differences in habits between social mediaon different screens: mobile, tablets, laptops and desktops?
Social has quickly adapted to life on mobiles and tablets. There are different consumption habits. On both tablet and mobile, users have a tendency to use an app to visit social media pages and a greater tendency also to use apps that allow them to surf multiple social media within one environment. One thing doesn’t change though: users visit social media pages a hell of a lot – more than 50% of Facebook users in SEA visit the site every single day with the upper percentile of regular users visiting more than 10 times a day. South East Asia is a truly social place and it’s all happening online. Advertisers have one choice: get involved.
Matt Sutton was part of the original senior management team brought over to set up Aktiv Digital. At 30, he is considered an ‘old hand’ in APAC media with over 10 years of cross-platform experience including print, press, outdoor and digital. Prior to Aktiv he ran outdoor sales teams for CBS in China. Sutton is based in Singapore where he oversees Aktiv’s expansion across the region.
