Article by Nils Maier published on July 10, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
The innovative means of online marketing are the future. Thus, the results of a study conducted by Harris Interactive can be summarized. On behalf of the PR agency Fleishman & Hillard, 5000 European consumers were questioned about any influence the internet has on their purchase decisions. The results were classified by the CEO of Fleishman & Hillard towards the FAZ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) as follows:
“The influence of the internet is much stronger than expected – and much bigger than the marketing budgets which are fed into the net. I expect that the budgets will soon be rearranged towards the internet.”
The future for online marketing in the collaborative media seems to look very promising. According to the results of Harris, however, the traditional forms of online marketing virtually have no influence on the individual consumer’s purchase decisions. On the other hand, market researchers were able to observe the fact that the more complex a product is, the higher will the influence of user opinions on an individual consumer’s purchase decisions be. If the data is to believed, the internet will become the major field for marketers in future. The change of media use in favour of the internet alone already illustrates this consequential development. However, in the field of e-business, it is not at all sufficient to rely on the traditional elements of online marketing. In fact, it is of greater importance to utilize the communicative character of collaborative media for a successful marketing. But how could such marketing tools look like? How much effort will it take and which range can be covered? Maybe the illustration below can provide answers to these questions:
Article by Fiana de Guzman published on July 10, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
In the course of an ABC interview, Michael Arrington provided some interesting insights into his thoughts and estimations around the Yahoo/Google deal. Here, his estimations concerning the collaboration of the two internet giants in the future are truly interesting. In the opinion of the Techcrunch chief blogger, the deal between the two companies will fail due to the United States antitrust law. This failure would result in the Yahoo share price still going further down the drain. The rather low rate of Yahoo shares will eventually prompt Microsoft to act in order to incorporate Yahoo as a bargain. It should be quite interesting to see whether Michael Arrington will be right after all.
This weekend I read on techcrunch a nice article about Dave Sifry who started a new company called Offbeat Guides which produces custom made travel guides. The pdf Version you can receive within minutes and the print version within 4 working days.
Article by Nils Maier published on March 14, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
The third part of the ethority survey illustrates the topics discussed within the user generated media in the context of social networks. The basis for this survey was provided by 6000 user opinions in weblogs and online communities. Here, ethority GmbH & Co. KG evaluated comments concerning the issue of online communities in 900 blogs and 300 communities. After having concluded the analysis, the ethority survey was able to verify three main issues in the communication channels within the user generated media: The three issues which were mentioned most frequently in the context of social networks and which are falling in the category of marketing are advertising, recommendation and data security.
In evidence, these results demonstrate that online communities possess an immense recommendation potential in the social networks. Every other user opinion in online communities (52,21%) concerning social networks is either a negative or positive word of mouth recommendation for the respective communities. Such a high density of recommendations cannot be found within the blogosphere. Here, on the other hand, the major network issue is marketing. The continuous discussion about the marketing potential of the networks, the heated debate about Facebook’s Beacon or the Behaviour Targeting in connection with StudiVZ seem to highly attract the bloggers’ attention. Virtually every other blog entry (51,18%) which is concerned with social networks discusses the issue of marketing and advertising. The bloggers’ second main issue is the discussion about data security in the context of social networks. The results show that the blogosphere takes a strong interest in the discussion about social networks in respect of content. In particular, it participates in the discourse about data security and marketing of the social networks. Online communities, however, rather focus on the exchange of experiences made in the use of networks, for instance new applications on Facebook. Basically, online communities also take part in public opinion forming, though more likely from a point of view which concerns dealing practically with the respective networks.
Article by Nils Maier published on March 13, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
The second part of the ethority survey about user insights concerning social networks focuses on the image of the various communities.
Discussions about the social network marketing are still omnipresent within the respective media. There was a storm of protest when Facebook, StudiVZ, etc. tried to merchandise the users’ profiles by measures which were questionable with regard to the protection of data privacy. Numerous calls for boycott and resignation stirred up the debates concerning the marketing strategies of the network operators even more and eventually caused the operators in question to concede. Facebook, for instance, was apparently quite considerate of their own online reputation when the controversial feature Beacon was no longer being offered. But which impact did these discussions have on the networks’ image from the German users’ point of view? The ethority survey was able to demonstrate that bloggers favoured the platform Netmoms, as over 53% approved of the network for mothers. The network Jappy.de also featured quite positive image results within the blogosphere. SchülerVZ, StudiVz’s little brother, was able to achieve the third place in this ranking. Less surprising were the image results of the portal StudiVZ.
These results show that recent discussions about StudiVZ have an apparent impact on the online reputation of the Holtzbrinck portal. Perhaps Holtzbrinck succeeds to escape the image crisis by means of their third network. Schüler.cc, however, does not share the bad reputation of its congener StudiVZ. At any rate, there are no negative comments on Schüler.cc within the online communities. Thus, this student network is the most popular community in German communities. It seems as if the networks’ recent marketing initiatives have put a damper on the users’ mood. In any case, StudiVZ should improve the marketing strategies for their user profiles. Here, Facebook sets the direction and the magic word is Widgets. These small applications on the user profiles are provided by companies such as tripadvisor or the Washington Post. No user of the Zuckerberg network complains about this way of marketing. The reason for this might be the additional benefit which the users obtain from these offers.
Method: The analysis exclusively refers to comments which have been written in user generated media, such as online communities, weblogs, newsgroups, commentaries and on press websites. The analysis of the surveyed main unit is carried out by a special hardware and finally evaluated by market research experts.
Article by Nils Maier published on March 10, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
German users like to present themselves in online networks such as StudiVZ, Xing, etc. But what is their opinion of these networks? Which communities enjoy a good reputation with their clientele and which are rather disreputable? Which networks are frequently discussed within the web?
Particularly noticeable about these results was the fact that, in the context of networks, the blogosphere picked out Xing as a central theme exceptionally often. With 7,5% of the Blogbuzz, StudiVZ comes in second in the ethority ranking.
The positions seem to be closely linked to the latest discussions about the intended marketing measures of these two networks. A surprise within the ethority Buzz Ranking was the position of the community netmoms.de. In the blogger-ranking, the Net-Moms achieved the fifth place.
Within the community Buzz about networks, Lokalisten is the major issue. For them, it seems, the relaunch of their portal was highly profitable. The freshly renovated community unites 21% of the buzz within online communities. In this comparison, the network Kwick achieves the second place.
A surprise, however, was the position of StudiVZ in this ranking. The users seem to be much less interested in the issue StudiVZ than the coverage in the traditional media gives reason to believe. Bloggers are, of course, excluded from this assumption.
-grafics follow-
„This Ranking illustrates that a large number of bloggers reflect and exert influence upon the general media coverage concerning XING and StudiVZ. In contrast to this, the exchange of opinions and recommendations of beneficial product values is rather associated with user and customer communities. At this, private experience communities are therefore the most discussed, linked and recommended. Recent studies were able to show that such user recommendations or word of mouth are the mainspring for the growth of social networks” affirms Sten Franke, managing director at ethority and head of the research group “customer satisfaction” at BITKOM.
In the course of this week, further results of this study will be presented here. It pays off to resume reading
Article by Nils Maier published on February 29, 2008 and filed unter Uncategorized.
Sten Franke, director of ethority GmbH & Co KG and advisor at the Competence Center Online Market Research of the competence site, was interviewed by the competence site and questioned about the ethority approach.
On your homepage, information-seeking users like us really get our money’s worth. Nevertheless, the user has to be somewhat familiar with a specific topic because the homepage displays a lot of information. Web 2.0 is a major issue but, moreover, there are also matters such as digital identity, digital reputation and Word of Mouth Marketing.
In which ways should companies deal with Web 2.0? Or, to put it more straightforward, what exactly are you doing and how is this concerned with market research?
Sten Franke (SF):
I will try to illustrate this plainly. Everybody can take part on Web 2.0. The internet has changed. Today it is not just the companies showing a communication which is, to a greater or lesser extend, oriented towards the same direction. In the past, companies more or less merely displayed their products on the web, just like a catalogue, only online. Subsequently, one could also order these products online; it was, however, still one-way. A dialogue takes place on web 2.0. The consumers, namely the users, give statements and invite other users to an exchange of opinions. This proceeds on web platforms such as blogs and online communities. The use of public media, and thereby the purchase habits, has changed completely. Before purchasing anything, you compare your experiences gained concerning brands and products. Consumers organize themselves in communities, e.g. the German speaking BMW community, in which over 50.000 BMW owners, and thus BMW purchasers, participate. In these communities they discuss the brand, the specific models, their experiences and their expectations. These are millions of opinions, which are more or less openly displayed. Of course, you have to forage for them, analyze, cluster and evaluate them. This is our task, our way to carry out market research. You see, the ordinary market researcher records purchaser opinions by placing a handful of people in a room which is equipped with cameras and a one-way-mirror and then asks questions. This is what you would call a focus group. But is the composition of the group representative at any time? Is it possible to rule out any influence exerted by the interviewer? Are the group’s responses always honest and true or are there answers which are socially desirable? We are familiar with these concerns and we have the solution. The opinions on the web provide the largest focus group possible and we can rule out influences from the beginning. We are just observing.
You observe what happens on the internet? How does this work? Do you launch a search engine?
Sten Franke:
First of all, we work much more accurately, that is to say, more thoroughly than ordinary search engines. Although search engines are great for the average user, they can capture only parts of all websites. Within the Deep Web, which is the total of all openly accessable legal and illegal websites, less than 1% can be located by these ordinary search engines. We, however, locate 95%. ethority is using novel semantic analysis technologies, such as gridmaster. By means of a complex algorithm, we obtain a segmentation of groups and opinions and are able to process millions of these opinions within next to no time. On one occasion, the “Tagesschau“ reported on gridmaster and gave the résumé: “Gridmaster surfs the web like a human being, only 1.000 times faster”. Well, nowadays you could add three zeros more. This is the quantitative aspect. Our multilingual research team contributes the qualitative analysis. Thus, we are able to give answers to the most diversified questions, for example: Where and in which way is my brand positioned in comparison to its competitors? How is my brand perceived and in what ways is this perception altered by my current marketing campaign? Or by the political or social climate? – I am speaking of recent events, which have an external cause. Other particular problems are, for example, which level of customer satisfaction I have achieved and how I can improve the products or processes within my company by providing information. These are questions which concern every business company, while we give answers based on real data in real-time. At ethority, many time wasters are simply omitted. We do not have selection processes lasting for weeks, until we have accumulated a hundred participants for a survey. And, what is more, there is no need to let them argue in groups over weeks and weeks. We fish thousands of their opinions out of the web and evaluate the data. This is the foundation for our manner of market research, which is genuine and fast.
All this sounds so wonderfully easy. But it cannot be all that simple? How does a typical project with ethority take course?
Sten Franke:
Well, at first I have to say: the easiest things are often the best. But it is not as if you only need a smart monitoring technology and receive a great market analysis on demand. Ethority’s true capital is the know-how of our team of analysts concerning sectors, which was built up within almost 10 years. We were able to gain extensive project experience in all pivotal sectors. Because of our analysts being multilingual, we are capable of obtaining data from every market in the world in no time and with rather little effort. But before we settle down to work, we define the types of tasks with our clients in a briefing process. This concerns analyses of brand positioning, image quality, segmentation reports, issues and customer satisfaction as well as campaign tracking. Thus, we pose the questions which need answering. Subsequently, we analyse the semantic details in a pre-study, that is, the keywords in all combinations possible as well as the channels etc. With the help of this vocabulary of concepts, our gridmaster software, statistic probabilities, Bayesian-Belief-Netoworks and FuzzyLogic, webmonitoring debuggers are developed which we call bots. In a manner of speaking, these bots continue to refine themselves, in such a way as to analyse, segment and categorise only opinions within specific target groups. The categorised data is veryfied by our research team and post-coded in case of doubt. This is the foundation for the answering of quantitative questions. Moreover, we are able to pose further questions by including the database output at hand. These issues can be tracked down by the use of additional semantic filters. During the qualitative analysis, the obtained results in the form of blog entries or online community comments are evaluated and processed by interpreting the procured opinions. However, our job is far from ending here. We do not just compile data, we can do more and we do want more.
This takes us to the matter of your segment studies and your brand monitor. In which way are they relevant? Or are they mere instruments of acquisition?
Sten Franke:
No, it is certainly more than just that. These studies are first and foremost examples for our course of action, because the issue of webmonitoring is quite unknown to many people. In this process, we try to demonstrate what is possible. In the US you use the nice word “buzz” for any kind of spontaneous statement, which we adopted at once for our brand monitor 2.0, namely bobi, which stands for brand online buzz index. bobi is an enduring omnibus survey, which pinpoints where, how, with which level of intensity and in which topical context brands are discussed on web 2.0. Consequently, bobi is the first online brand monitor which evaluates consumer opinions on the web regarding to brand image, brand publicity, brand ranking as well as the major topics, all devided by sector and target group in monthly cycles. Based on predetermined criteria, our clients receive their own evaluated brand buzz in the course of this omnibus survey. Then you are able to compare results of the total market and identify trends favoured by the target group. Furthermore, it can be found out what your competitors are doing and how this is perceived by the consumers. You learn what makes the sectors tick. As I said before, you will get an impression of our course of action by our surveys. But, of course, this varies from client to client. The reportings all look extremely different; this implies, for example, web interface and database including visual data preparation and trend charts as well as excel files and complex management reports. Our clients often ask for strategy recommendation and, therefore, we jointly work out possibilities for an implementation. In order to do this, we also visit the respective company and work on location.
What will come after web 2.0? Will the changes continue? In which direction does ethority want to go?
Sten Franke:
We are prepared for web 3.0, you just wait… No, seriously, our task is clearly formulated: to establish our methods as an add-on, an alternative to the conventional market research. Many corporate groups are, although they describe themselves as being innovative, a bit deadlocked concerning market research. They initiate their focus groups at their favoured institute and that’s it. But we are able to convince even these creatures of habit more and more, initially for a pilot project. Consequently, they realize that we detect trends of the market much quicker and more accurate than others. For the benefit of convincing we want to expand our bobi. Soon it will be possible to use it internationally in four languages. We are developing new trend-scouting tools and intend to engage more in public matters than we did before.
