Change is Inevitable

You've reached one of MindComet's legacy blogs. We're no longer posting here, but we're definitely still blogging. Visit http://blogs.mindcomet.com to find our current blogs and you can follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mindcomet.

We've Moved!

Just a quick note - we have consolidated our blogs, and CGM Voodoo will not be updated in the near future. However, feel free to visit our other active blogs for engaging content. CGM topics will continue to be covered on Viral Voodoo, Gen Y Voodoo, and Online Marketing Voodoo as well as our marketing podcast, Internet Marketing Voodoo.

Host of Your Own Domain

MySpace.com doesn't understand the term slow down. The latest article from Broadcasting and Cable, reported that the site has a new initiative that will launch soon.

The new service allows users to "host" streams of shows on their home page. This seems like a selfless act by marketers to increase consumer control over media, but it's so much more. It's a one-site stop for marketers to reach a target demographic because MySpace had 64.4 million unique visitors as of February; this is the stuff marketers' dreams are made of.

Media companies are the most likely candidates to team with social networking sites because the nature of the business lends itself to mass marketing, but companies need to stay ahead of the curve and determine creative ways to use social networking sites to their advantage because the connection with users is already in place.

A Secret Worth Knowing About CGM

It's not a social network per say, yet most social networks have allowed it to be part of them. Photobucket, which is a site that allows users to search, upload and share pictures and videos, is a relative unknown in the social networking world, unless one perused the likes of MySpace or Facebook.

These sites allow users to link photos stored in Photobucket and place them on user pages. The secret to Photobucket's current success of 38 million members is linking, according to a Fortune article. Linking shelters the site from fads because if one social network falls the photos are still stored on Photobucket, and users can just place them on a different social network.

This brilliant business model has allowed the site a niche foothold in the consumer-generated media realm. Instead of competing with mega-sites like Facebook, Photobucket adds value by allowing more freedom to the user. Companies' sites need to find a way, like Photobucket did, to ward off threats of changing consumer preferences.

Seeing Success from Failure

Facebook.com, which is the No. 2 social networking site, has recently seen a huge increase in the number of users since its stumble in September, according to an article from Reuters.

A comScore report confirms that Facebook.com now has 24.8 million visitors worldwide-- that's 75 percent growth since September. The key to this success isn't something built upon a complex marketing strategy, it's simply learning from the mistakes and moving forward. The site solicited feedback from its users on different features and has implemented that feedback to add and take away features as necessary.

Too often corporate policy ties rewards and promotions to performance; therefore, leaving little room for error. In reality, it is failure that teaches a company the most because knowing what doesn't work will lead to what does. Instead of treating failure as an aberrant event, try using failure as a motivating tactic for employees.

Consumers For Hire

The newest thing with online media is actually hiring consumers to do the work for advertisers, according to AdAge.

XLNTads is initiating this concept allowing marketers to post concepts and consumers to choose which ones they want to produce. Marketers will save a substantial amount of money with this operation and it will provide a more personalized viewpoint in the ads.

Consumers are already utilizing this media on a consistent basis, so why shouldn't corporations use them? Consumers can easily identify what would appeal to them in online media and will sufficiently target appropriate markets by having this knowledge.

Online Video to the Rescue

Among consumers aged 12 and older, 44 percent use online video media. That's approximately 100 million people viewing online digital videos. And one in four Americans has downloaded a digital video file.

The 2006 biannual digital video study by Ipsos Insight from Motion realized that the primary reason for that number not being higher was due to consumers unwillingness to pay for streaming videos. This presents a valuable opportunity for marketers as they may sponsor these short films and move onto full feature films to subsidize the cost. Marketers may utilize this media by coordinating their name with the sought out video and or include product placements within the sponsored films.

This is such a grand possibility to grow brand awareness and establish the companies online identity that it would be unreasonable not to pursue this avenue. The demand for this media is expanding at an amplified rate.

Measuring the Effectiveness of CGM

When researching an advertisers biggest problem you will find that measurement tools are at the top of the list. BuzzLogic is helping to relieve some of this frustration. By implementing the four metrics below a company can determine the influential players in social media:

• Site's contextual relevance to a topic area specified by the client

• Frequency of content publication on the topic

• Number of inbound links

• Traffic

By using these tools , marketers can successfully target their ads and media toward the proper audience, leading to greater promotion. Consumer generated media executed successfully will identify and market to a firm's consumers in a more efficient manner.

A Milestone for CGM

March 25th was the day the world changed, at least the online world as it pertains to consumer-generated media, according to a MarketingVox article. YouTube hosted its first video awards and the turn out was a great success! One winner had 13 million consumers trafficking their video.

Online video sharing is something that is accessible to consumers and businesses, so lets wed the two. Marketers can place ads alongside the videos, sponsor the videos and add their own online videos to YouTube.

Demand for this medium is high and marketers need to respond quickly. Advertising content targeted at different segments can easily be applied and should. Some marketers fear openness of content as they think it could compromise the brand's identity, but really what a corporation is doing is building a relationship with its target markets by way of social media.