The mind blowing penetration of Social Media almost sounds like a revolutionary bell for online marketers. Challenging new ways of marketing adventure opens up tons of new methods and possibilities.

However, I am more interested in with the question of “Does it really work this way” or alternatively “Should we discover wiser ways to use these social and technological phenomena”

Let me explain you how I feel myself at the very beginnings of this deep tunnel. There is the bombardment of social web sites, social web projects, social web applications, social mobile and iphone applications, Conferences and expos, marketing kudos and online marketing methods.  There is no day passed without tons of blog posts about social media and how it is going to turn marketing and our lives into a magic.

If something becomes overcrowded and inflationary, then we must be very careful about it because this means that quality, creativity and sustainability are consumed at the expense of the quantity. In a nutshell if something is too much mentioned then its value becomes less and less and finally faints away.

This is exactly how I feel about “Social Media” today. I want to be a part of it but:

1. Social media sites are in lack of functionality. In order to avoid those shortcomings, they open up their API to third party developers who are producing countless solutions to use this Social websites effectively.
Unfortunately, the outcome of this situation is massive amounts of new applications which are sprung up everyday without quality control or any integrated brand-consumer confidence into them. All the risk is on users’ shoulders.

2. If I want to have a “Targeted follow up list by Twitter” because I am engaging in different groups such as affiliate marketing, travel, diving and etc. Therefore I need to categorize people in terms of their profession or interests in order to send those right messages.  I have to do my homework and make a good research to find a third party solution. We must admit that by technology we want to solve problems efficiently, cheaply and fast. Unfortunately our current Social Media Revolution is not echoing any of these features. If any project is producing new problems instead of solutions, I think we must stop there.

If I could not find it within Twitter then where is the idea of “Technology makes our lives easier and faster approach” Do I have the luxury of spending my time over searching for third party solutions while I am trying to create value for my business and my clients? Unfortunately I do not have this luxury.

Being made all those critics does not mean that I am not a fan of Social Media. Instead Social Media is opening up a door for developing great skills of humanity, communication and online marketing. However, Social Media a is at its infancy.  Imposing too much meanings and duties onto it brings out only disappointment and failure.
The balance and harmony in any business field is an outcome of countless trials and errors, failures and patience. Problems and failures are teaching us to overcome those difficulties by wiser and solemn solutions.

So I believe that Social Media will evolve into a way that transforms itself from unproductive to productive:

1. “Appealing Huge Masses” Approach turns  into engaging into niche but relevant groups
2. Social Web start ups will come up with plans which are more self- sufficient in terms of functionality, applications and financially. The boundaries of the projects will be determined at their beginning.
3. Business plans in terms of revenue models and revenue projections will be more analytical.
4. The content created by social media contributors will become more self controlled without allowing spammers.

My point is, in conclusion, free flow of social media will finally reach a point where the influx of talent, innovation, planning, analytical thinking, experience, human collaboration and contribution will foster its path towards success together with fruitful outcomes for humanity and technology. In order to get to this point, we need to bite the bitter part first as it’s always be the case.

There is no day left without hearing news about “Social Media” or the hypothetical tools to monetize “Social Media” web sites.  Although for advertising, affiliate marketing or performance marketing social media is bringing new opportunities to the scene, I think “Social Media” cannot be a suitable environment for providing monetization means. Instead Social Media is going to be a way to build brand names and brand awareness , create social capital and trust for individuals or corporate.

Coincidentally my argument has found ground in the ideas of Bant Breen (Interpublic), Josh Stylman (Reprise Media), Raquel Krouse (Emerging Media Lab) and Brian Monahan (Universal McCann). They agreed the transformational effects of social media on consumers, marketers and corporate, but many did not actually find social media as an advertising platform. On the contrary, it is going to be an interaction platform among advertisers, agencies, and users with or without brands.

Internet is not all about cashing out and making profits. I think this is how we have to shape our future perception of internet. Yes internet has provided us with lots of fresh ways to monetize. For example “Search” becomes a commodity of this century which cannot be estimated years ago. However, Social Media is way to feed our hunger for information, communication and interaction.

This issue is still being discussed among affiliate marketers at Outspokenmedia.com from a different angle. The discussion is all about “Are Affiliate Links Unethical without Disclosure?” There are many different ideas about it which needs to be carefully examined. Let me share how I see the facts on this issue:

“I think the dilemma is in our evaluation of Social Media tools. Social Media Tools are for communicating, sharing opinions or having debates. It is not necessary to find monetization models everything that we are consuming. (yes, it’s true for the developers of those platforms, there must be a way to survive) It is unnatural to try to promote something in 140 characters. However, if you are really believing in some product (not thousands of them) only then there is no harm to put any link which is an affiliate link or not.

The best thing about Twitter is the way it let us to find valuable resources and people. So Twitter cannot be constantly consumed as a revenue stream. Instead it is a place to talk and share just like we meet new people in any physical social environment.”

Social Media Marketing becomes a buzz and is actually one of the most popular concepts of our period. Ranging from small business to giant corporations; everybody wants to be a part of it and exploit the benefits that it will provide.

Infact, at the first instance, Social Media seems to open all the doors for marketing activities with the direct interaction platform that it will provide for users of the social media and marketers. Many of the marketers might have the notion that if they will produce fun applications for social media platforms, display banners or create groups, they can easily increase their ROI.

In reality, Social Media is very sensitive and delicate just like a living organism. Actually the whole of social media users can be easily broken or made happy, can be easily engaging or running away from any marketing efforts. The balance between the marketing initiatives and the trust that any brand build between its user base will be the answer for successful Social Media campaigns.

Before setting up any Social Media Campaign the brands must set their goals and analyze if their goals can be achieved through Social Media Marketing Tools and different Social Media Platforms. Social Media is an eco-system where the brands can increase their exposure and brand awareness, interact and communicate with their user base and check the trends and behaviors of their client base. Social Media is very organic and promptly reacts to any wanted or unwanted actions. So any strategy must be carefully designed and the outcomes must be in a very predictable range.
This leaving organism is a source of precious information only if it can be fed by right ingredients.

There are a lot of tools to market brands via Social Media Platforms.
1. Displaying banners
2. Creating fan groups or pages
3. Video ads
4. Applications for increasing brand awareness
5. Direct Response ( blogging, commenting, posting links etc)
6. Social SEO
7. Virtual gifts and goods
8. Micro blogging on multi platforms
9. Retweets
10. Friends or Followers .

The flip side of the coin also signs another delicate point about Social Media. The CEO’s and investors of Social Media are trying to find a sustainable and viable method to monetize the services they are providing. Unfortunately just like Social Media Marketing Strategies, Social Media is also at its infancy. There is yet no rule set which can clear the way to establish a monetization system. This will lead to many ups and downs, trials and errors which will probably give rise to many public complaints about social media platforms in the near future. The privacy issues will play major role in the users’ perception of social media.
Thus not only choosing the right social marketing tool but also choosing the right Social Media Platform plays significant role in the social media marketing efforts . Plus following up the policy changes associated with those platforms constitutes top priority for a long term success of any social media campaign.
There is no day left without seeing any article about how Facebook or Twitter is going to shape up their monetization plans. There are lots of rumors and theories about those monetization actions. Marketers must be aware of the fact that our generation is the first generation to shape up the nature of social media and live through all the pains and joys of this transition period.

Today, I would like to share my story with “Facebook Ads” and glad to here yours too.

“Precisely target by age, gender, location, and more” This is the statement on Facebook Add page. In fact my concern is on the word “more”. There is no clear description about “more”. Are we displaying our Affmeter ads on Facebook by the criteria of “More”. This situation annoyed me very much and but I would like to give it a shot and I have created an Ad campaign for Affmeter a few weeks ago. The funny thing is when I describe my keyword as “affiliate” in Facebook’s keyword suggestion box, it referred me only 160 people out of 14,611,760 UK Facebook users as my target group!

Facebook is relating keywords on the basis of users information listed in their Facebook profiles, such as Activities, Favorite Books, TV Shows, Movies, etc. However there is no mention about ” Groups “  which can make sense for an advertiser. Since facebook users become group members in subjects which they are really interested. Does Facebook Ad Mangement Team find “Groups” as an irrelevant subject for targeting an audience? I am really curious about this question.

Let me give you the stats of my Ads for two weeks: Affmeter Ad has 173,920 impressions and 67 clicks with CTR %0.04 over two weeks. And my referrer list shows

http://apps.facebook.com/mindjolt/games/scarab-solitaire http://apps.facebook.com/texas_holdem/index.php
http://apps.facebook.com/petsociety/

I can not see any connection of Affmeter with Games, Texas Holdem or Petsociety. So its all waste of time and money for me.
If Facebook wants to become a real power as Ad Giant, it has a long way on working their Ad System.