Undergraduate social networking

8 out of 10 Australian undergraduates are using the web for social networking, almost twice the number who go online to game (42%), according to a new study by Daemon Digital.

Facebook and YouTube were the most commonly used sites by young Australians with MySpace in third place. Online photo site, Flickr and dating site, RSVP also made it in the Top Ten social networking sites used.

The popularity of social networking has grown exponentially in the last 24 months and, as a result, these sites are finally beginning to gain recognition among Australian businesses. Social networks are being used for recruitment purposes, trialling new products and supporting product launches. But they are only now beginning to gain recognition.

While business heads and marketers are in agreement that they must start to use social networking channels, the vast majority are not sure where to start or how to get involved. Businesses cannot afford to ignore this migration and one of the best approaches is to treat online social media in the same way as organisations value traditional networking – attend and engage in conversations where those conversations are being held.

Many organisations still expect consumers to find their content on corporate sites, which of course many do. The corporate site is a business necessity in the same way as a letterhead used to be, but many organisations would be better served actively seeking out users to engage them in conversation.

The first step has got to be to listen to the conversations that are underway and finding out a little more about your organisation’s reputation in social media. Software tools such as Social Radar, combined with human understanding are very illuminating for most organisations.

Monetising Facebook

The Sydney Morning Herald, filing from Davos, reports that Facebook is planning to harness the personal information it holds on its members to make one of the world's largest market research databases available to corporate buyers.

Facebook has struggled to monetise its strength with advertising revenues slow to start and the aborted attempt to monetise member behaviour through the Beacon software system which tracked member’s activity both through Facebook and through third party sites which also had Beacon installed.

Online research panels have been in existence for some time and do offer a very cost effective alternative research solution for a range of research assignments. This is an interesting move from Facebook and a very logical and sensible way to harness member’s time on site whilst providing some reward for member’s loyalty to the royalty of online social networking.