Marketing in Today’s
Open & Social World
Mark Suster
YPO – January 2013
@msuster

 Ex software developer
(‘91)
 BuildOnline
(’99)
 Koral / Salesforce.com
Both Sides Of The Table
(’05)
 VC at GRP Partners
(‘07)

The Marketing Landscape Changes Very Quickly These
Days.
Pre Web 95 - 2007 08 - Now 10 - Now Future
Mobile,
Who
Offline Online Social Video,
Knows?
Images
• TV • Display • FB Ads • Pre-roll
• Print • Email • FB Likes • Overlays
• Radio • SEO • Twitter • Brand Integration
• SEM • FB Timeline • CPI

What IS Clear
 Pace of change will accelerate
 All marketing is becoming digital or being
supported by digital measurement
 You need to be metrics driven & test a lot
 You need to monitor emerging trends &
experiment (saying it’s for the younger
generation is no longer an excuse)

A Quick Primer on Social
Networks

In the 80’s there were already “social
networks” but they weren’t open.

In the 90’s AOL bridged the gap between pre-
Internet & Internet with a Walled Garden

Web 1.0 made it easier to have personal pages on “the
web” (e.g. not AOL). But publishing was one way

Web 2.0 was born: 2-way communications and
easier to publish multimedia
Blogging Photos Video

Facebook won the war for broad-based social networking in 2008 & has
since gone mainstream.

Twitter is really a totally different
paradigm. Twitter makes things “open”
 Asymmetric
 Public
 Limited characters;
thus
 Link-sharing platform

Twitter is a much more pervasive business
tool than people comprehend
 Marketing channel
 News reader
 Instant messaging
 Data mine
 Customer service Dept

And we all know that social is going mobile

All of the major networks are battling for
primacy of your time.
Open, Business Broad Based
Media Centric Networking Networks
 Wants to be your  Digital resume  Your portal to the
“second screen” TV web
 Industry networking
 Our unique online  Communications,
 Sales & marketing
persona / next entertainment
tool
generation email
 Longer-term:
address
payments

Quick View of the Future

1. We’re going from a Social Graph to an
Interest Graph.
Who You Know What You Like

2. From Closed to Open Data
Timeline Your “Open Graph” & Tweets That
Friends See Anybody Can See

3. From Web to Mobile
Web Browsers Mobile Apps
 Location aware
 Personal device
 Bottom end of sales funnel
 Smaller form factor

4. From Text to Images to Video
Yesterday - Today – Image Tomorrow -
Texting Sharing Video

What will this all mean:
• for you?
• for marketing?

The First Version of Online Marketing Was Buying
Banner Ads – sold like print as CPMs
Banner
Skyscraper

But People Don’t Pay Attention to the Banners
Banner
Skyscraper
99% of
User Attention

Jakob Neilsen eye-tracking has confirmed this:
click through rates (CTR) = 0.08%

Search Next Came “Sponsored Search” – 80+% of All
Term Internet Advertising $
1. Intent-
Based Ads
2. Organic
Result

Monetizable With any monetizable search term Google becomes a pretty
Search Term hostile place for users & expensive for advertisers
1. Intent-
Based Ads
3. Google
Comparison
Shopping
2. Organic
Results

The Power of Google is Precisely That They Drove Such
a High Percentage of Most Sites’ Traffic
1999 2005
10% 7.5%
7.5%
15%
30%
20%
75%
30%

But Google Became Vulnerable to Social Networking &
Why You Need to Pay Attention to Social
2005 2013
7.5% 5%
7.5% 5%
30% 30% +
20%
20%
15%
30%
20%

And Then It All Changes
Again ;-)
• Mobile
• Video

Mobile form factor makes ads harder. Plus it’s a phone. Easy
to imagine the most effective ad unit.
Tiny Banner Click to Call

In video the ad unit is also pretty obvious: Videos. Although shorter
in format than TV
Pre-Roll
Video

Brand integration (aka product placements) is also
performing well. Example: Style Hauls
Blair Fowler Elle Fowler
750,000 views

Making Social Media
Actionable

Blogging is the foundation. It helps build a direct relationship
with your audience. Build “point of view” marketing

Twitter is where your customers go to amplify word of
mouth feedback
“American Airlines #Sucks”
“#EpicFail at BestBuy today. No
customer support
“You’ve got to go see #Argo – best
film of the year”

The information is not anonymous. You can find out
your influencers & conversions and build programs
around them.
$57.50 $331.22
direct purchasesdownstream
purchases
15 6 58
clicks downstream downstream
shares clicks
$74.2
$94.09 $97.09 1 $65.02
direct purchasesdownstream direct direct purchases
purchases purchases
19 2 14 11 1 7 7
clicks downstream downstream clicks downstream downstream clicks
shares clicks share clicks
$78.12 $19.78 $18.41
direct purchases
direct purchases direct purchases
9 5 7
clicks clicks clicks

Twitter can be also be used to drive audience to your
blog to grow your influence with your key
constituencies
It’s about winning “share of
mind”

Blogs can be used to inform customers about your
products and drive traffic to your website / products
Your Website

Blogs & Websites improve inbound traffic to your
website by giving you more content to be searched
Your Website

Your blog & website can drive traffic to Facebook where you
can build “fans” and engage with customers
Your Website

And of course Your blog, website & Facebook help you add
more Twitter followers.
Your Website

Which is how a guy like me with no staff to support him gets
86,000
Followers
300,000 - 12,600
600,000 Fans
Monthly Page
Views
Your Website
90+% of GRP’s
Inbound Traffic

And if I Could do it With No
Staff, Imagine What Your
Company Could Do

Just get over your stereotype
that social media is about
telling people what you had for
lunch

Marketing in Today’s
Open & Social World
Mark Suster
YPO – January 2013
@msuster