Everybody has heard of them. Everyone has joined them and more likely visited one in the past few hours.
You are probably trying to figure out what I am referring to which is social networking sites. Some of the bigger sites are Classmates.com, MySpace, LinkedIn and Facebook. I am sure everyone has heard of them and probably registered with each of those sites. I believe each of those sites have over 100 million registered users.
There are ones that you may never have heard of like:
- Geni.com
- imeem
- Last.fm
- Orkut
- Plaxo
- PerfSpot
Until I did some research while writing this posting, I had not heard of those six social networking sites. Have you? I am assuming the answer is no for most of you. The interesting thing is, that each of those sites have over 10 million registered users. Yes I said 10 million registered users!
We all know the world is changing and changing very quickly. Clearly these sites have a role in research.
- What is it?
- How are you using social networking sites for research projects?
- What success are you having?
- Are there any white papers that you can share?
I look forward to hearing your comments.
Amy Shields says:
I am so glad you have chosen this topic. The term “social networking site” (or “professional networking”, depending on the site) is definitely the buzz phrase of the past couple of years. While I continue to seriously try and determine applications for any of these sites for my own business, I’ve pretty much come up empty handed, yet seem to constantly hear how they are effective tools for the research profession. It obviously takes more than creating a profile for your company and calling it a day. Likewise, there are a ton of issues around security and use as a database tool. I totally ‘get’ how it can be used for professional growth and opportunities, but what (specific to qualitative) about database development and locating hard to reach audiences? Has anybody found a productive use for these sites without jeopardizing the integrity of the research process? I’d love to hear about that. Some have great opportunities for advertising within very set and reasonable budgets, which I have found effective, and some local ones (YELP in the Bay Area, for example) have absolutely assisted with hard to reach audiences, but other than that and the advertising potential, I’m coming up empty-handed. Can’t wait to see if others have insight they’re willing and able to share. (FYI – Plaxo is a fairly well-known site; the others, I’ve never heard of either!)
SeanJJordan says:
Wow, this sounds like a great white paper topic. Aside from Plaxo, I know about Orkut (Google’s social networking site) and Last.fm (which is related to legally sharing and sampling music in a sort of virtual radio station manner). But what I was going to suggest is that these are all second-tier sites compared to the big guys (Facebook, Myspace, Second Life, Youtube, Flickr, Livejournal, Club Penguin or LinkedIn), and I’d be willing to bet that many people who have accounts on these more specialized communities also have accounts with the primary ones. I use Gmail, so I have an Orkut account and a Picassa account by extension; I have a Yahoo! account, so I have a Deli.cio.us account and a Flickr account. They all go hand-in-hand.
One of the big problems with all of these sites, however, is that they tend to generate a sound and a fury signifying nothing where marketers are concerned. You can ABSOLUTELY use Facebook for marketing communication and/or marketing research if you’re savvy, but the “targeted ad” system isn’t worth paying for unless you’ve got a product that is youth-oriented and a message that is being communicated across other media at the same time. When I was an undergrad last year, I used Facebook to conduct a referral method survey for research used in a national marketing competition, and I achieved some impressive results for my convenience sample in a fairly short amount amount time. But I attribute that to the novelty of asking students to take surveys, and not because they were genuinely interested in participating in opinion research.
What WOULD be interesting would be developing applications that could allow research panels to be formed over social networking sites. Panel members could probably be compensated with very low incentives, and possibly even incentives tied into the social networking environment. The advantage would be tying research into their real identities. The problem, however, is that the panels would tend to skew young and tech-savvy, making them only useful for certain kinds of research.
I’ll look around and see if I can find any articles on these specific sites, or on social networking and marketing research techniques. If I find them, I’ll post them up!
Rick Johnson says:
The only two I am familiar with from your list is Orkut (had an account) and Plaxo (have an active account). Plaxo is great as you can use it in Outlook and it automatically keeps people updated with you most current contact information.
It also allows you to create a signature/business card block that enables you to put your company tag line there, website info, etc. I think that it is great! Two thumbs up!!
Harry Heller says:
We have belonged to Geni for a year. It is the most fantastic tool for generating a genealogical map of your family.
A relative of mine in Israel invited me to join and when I go on the site now I have 2,500 family members. including 1st to 3rd cousins, great, great grand uncles long deceased and it gives my kids and myself a great picture of where they came from, who their uncles and aunts are and who that kid is that they once met at that wedding and Bar Mitzvah.
It is simple to use, you can enter names of relatives and invite them to do their family chain and you get notified of every birthday and anniversary with a message like “your brothers mother-in laws aunt is celebrating her 102 birthday.”
As Americans spread out across the world, often far from their families, this on keeps people continents and decades apart to stay in touch.
Dan Ness says:
Plaxo may sound more like a dental mouthwash than what it is, but it’s likely to change soon. It was recently bought by Comcast.
You’re bringing up a very important issue. The way people communicate is still changing. Social networking has gotten more press lately, yet it’s been more than a decade in the making. Our latest Technology User Profile wave showed email use still dropping (a little) among younger users and social networking now rising among those older than 18-24.
So, any researchers relying on email alone will have yet one more bias to deal with. It’s similar to what happened with the adoption of cellphones while people were pulling their landlines. Researchers who only do phone surveys on landlines risk missing part of a representative audience. Of course, in most cases we’re talking about small percentages of the entire market. Still, any sampling plan needs to review the percentage within their target audience to see what they may or may not be missing.
Krista Joyce says:
Holy Smokes Merrill – I’m sooooo glad you brought this topic up and I am chomping at the bit to reply!
Social Networking/Social Media in general is having a profound effect on our industry! Our CEO, Simon Chadwick, is hosting an educational webinar next month about this very topic:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/join/575308587/106421276
Click here to learn more or to register
Peanut Labs, Inc specializes in accessing over 37 million social network users a month thanks to our integrated partnerships with over 80 Social Networks such as facebook, plaxo, google open social, live journal and so on…. We connect with our pre-profiled panelists thru their social network when they are logged in live – pretty fancy stuff. People are surprised to see the impact these kinds of sites have on their research…..
We’re up to our eye balls in data and case studies that Simon will be sharing during his presentation.
I would love to answer all of your questions for this blog entry but I’m afraid I may take up too much room
Cheers!
Krista Joyce
Merrill Dubrow says:
Krista,
Appreciate your comments. Without giving away company secrets can you share with us a situation or two where you have used the data to solve client issues? Sort of a preview to some of what Simon will be presenting.
I am sure everyone would love to know what is going on in this methodology.
Thanks.
Merrill
Krista Joyce says:
Happily – but this is a long one!
Really what Web 2.0/Social Networking boils down to is that this is simply the new Internet. Internet= what started as a shared database of info has now evolved into a more interactive and engaging environment. Social Networks specifically contribute to this phenomena because they allow people to dictate/customize what they’re exposed to when they’re online according to what they like or dislike – truly user oriented!
The biggest client issue we solve (on a continual basis) is that we reach a core demographic that traditional online/commercial panels have always struggled with and that is Gen Y:13-34 yr olds. We also have tons of Gen Pop (18-64 yrs) but everyone has that – it’s easy……
Most notable is that we are the only provider in the US who can provide researchers direct access to teens (not thru their parent’s panel account like everyone else) and our data is obviously night & day in comparison. When you go to teens direct you can see the difference immediately – they have their own dialect/vernacular that is symbolic of text messaging/instant messaging with lots of acronyms i.e. lol= laugh out loud…..
Take this for example- One of our earliest clients thought we royally messed up their 10 yr long running tracker … at first…. until they ran some side tests that is.
Think about this – if you’re a 45 yr+ Mom who belongs to ABC Panel and you just spent 10 minutes trying to qualify for a study invite and at the very end the survey asks if your 17 yr son/daughter is available now take the survey with your consent (but it’s 11:00 am in the morning and your teen is still at school) – wouldn’t you just continue on – trying your best to simulate what you think your teen who would say? Goodness, you just invested 10 minutes of your time for that damn incentive… why not right? Well – that is often the issue and needless to say that screws up data….
Our Webinar with Simon will be chalk full of examples like and too leave you with some food for thought – did you know that the average user age on Facebook is now 36 yrs old and that every 30 days the mean age goes up by one year??? I think the most valuable information shared will be what Peanut Labs has learned about respondent engagement (whether 13 yrs old or 45 yrs old) and sampling directly from within the trusted world of a respondent’s Social Network versus that of an email based panel.
Social Networking isn’t so much about technology – researchers should know that is really more an attitude and it quickly becoming the organic habitat for people online. Forecasts state that over 80% of the global online population will belong to a Social Network of some sort within the next 3-5 years!
Cheers!
Krista
Merrill Dubrow says:
Krista,
Really appreciate your comments. I know the readers will enjoy reading your thoughts and hopefully a few will sign up for the web cast.
Thanks again.
Merrill
Merrill Dubrow says:
RECENT ARTICLE THAT I THOUGHT I WOULD SHARE.
Social Media: Short-Term Craze or Long-Term Phenomenon?
Either way, medium is not to be ignored by marketing researchers
By Pete Cape
Knowledge Director, SSI
The phenomenal rise of social media, in the form of Web sites such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, and Twitter, presents marketing researchers with a number of opportunities and challenges.
As a subject matter in itself, it is inherently interesting. Researchers want to know who’s using it and why, and how it is different from offline social interactions. Its very existence introduces important questions about personal privacy and data ownership. However, these questions are presently of minor interest to most researchers. Researchers see large groups of people gathered together in a relatively public space as a sampling opportunity rather than a social event – a means of gathering respondents and/or responses.
Challenges to this medium as a sampling source warrant consideration. Traditional sampling theory demands that, for a sample to be projectable to the population, it must be a random selection from the population of interest. In order to avoid bias, one needs to be confident that the sampling frame is universal or, at least, unbiased.
Facebook is not a conventional sampling frame
In the case of Facebook, for example, it is not universal; about 1% of the world’s population are members. In addition, registrants potentially represent a bias since they have actively chosen to join Facebook for the benefits it offers. In actuality, it is not a sampling frame. A Facebook member list is not available to marketing researchers, nor is there any single place where all Facebook members go.
In any medium, researchers must ask the right questions and be able to understand the answers. Interjecting a social media forum with a question which is “off topic” can be enough to get you expelled from the forum. Therefore, it’s preferable to find forums that are “on subject” and pose questions, or to post a link to a questionnaire that is on the subject. Researchers would be inviting the forum members to share opinions, not with each other, but with themselves and their clients.
The opportunity for a new form of research via social media Web sites is emerging that might be better described as consumer insight. Using the tools available in social media – Web 2.0 – such as blogs, forums, and instant polls, researchers are building communities of interest to freely discuss issues at hand. The social media aspects are augmented with moderated discussions and formal questionnaires. Many case studies have been presented that clearly demonstrate the value clients can extract from such projects and the positive personal benefits people get from participating. Web 2.0 is all about participating and contributing; this new research medium allows people to see that they have contributed in a way traditional research finds difficult.
Opportunities exist to recruit those otherwise unreachable
Additional value to the marketing researcher is that the new space delivers an opportunity to reach out to people who may not be recruitable for surveys by other means. After all, this is where these potential respondents “are,” rather than in a mall (waiting to be intercepted), at home (waiting for the phone to ring), or browsing the Web (waiting to see a recruitment ad). In addition, these sites provide a means of communication: members can be sent a message via the site, just as we use SMS (short message service) or e-mail that a survey is waiting for them.
Whether social media is just a craze or a phenomenon that becomes a part of everyday reality, researchers cannot afford to ignore it, just as they cannot afford to ignore the movement away from fixed line telephony, without compromising the integrity of sampling.
One of SSI’s core competencies is building and managing online communities. In addition to establishing its own research communities throughout the world, SSI creates and manages custom online communities built around specific interests or product categories.
Questions or comments? Pete can be reached at Pete_Cape@surveysampling.com.
Merrill Dubrow says:
Some good information that I thought I would share:
Ten Tips for Optimizing LinkedIn
by Barbara Safani
With over 25 million members, LinkedIn has grown to become a very powerful business and career management tool. Many are using it, but few have really optimized its value. Here are ten tips for creating a strong online presence.
1. Take the time to create a robust profile. Write a summary section that clearly outlines your personal brand and value add and gets readers jazzed up about what you do. Build out the specialties section and make it keyword rich and industry relevant. Many profiles on LinkedIn are just a shell with a name and an abbreviated chronology. You would never submit a resume to a potential employer that only listed employment, so why would you use this tactic on-line when your information is available for millions of people to see?
2. Use the endorsements feature to request and offer endorsements. People are more likely to contact you if you can prove that others have been satisfied with your work, product, or services. Adding endorsements can expedite the decision making process.
3. Keep your profile up to date. People who use LinkedIn for a job search campaign often abandon the tool after they find new employment. By keeping your information up to date, you are more likely to keep your network strong and be able to reciprocate to others.
4. Educate your connections. If people join LinkedIn and don’t invite others, they won’t get as much out of the tool and will remain several degrees apart from the people they want to meet.
5. LinkedIn doesn’t replace traditional networking, it facilitates it. Always supplement your on-line efforts with face-to-face networking.
6. Use the questions and answers feature to start conversations, create community, and position yourself as a subject matter expert. By answering questions, you are simultaneously endorsing your candidacy and expertise.
7. Don’t add a connection that you would not feel comfortable introducing to someone already in your network. Having 500 connections doesn’t have much value if you can’t share the love.
8. Don’t use the invitation to connect templates. They lack authenticity and are inferior when compared to a personalized message from you.
9. Create a public profile. This is an easy way to start building an on-line presence for yourself, since LinkedIn ranks high in the search engines. Add a vanity URL for greater differentiation.
10. Take advantage of resources that can help you optimize your Linked In profile including: http://www.linkedintelligence.com/ http://blog.linkedin.com/ http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2007/01/linkedin_profil.html http://www.happyabout.info/linkedinhelp.php http://www.happyabout.info/onlinenetworking.php
You can keep your LinkedIn presence healthy and strong by reviewing and updating the content frequently, sending and accepting new invitations, offering and requesting endorsements, and posing and answering questions. Try to spend at least 30 minutes per week managing your LinkedIn presence. Your persistence will pay off.
Barbara Safani, owner of Career Solvers,
(http://www.careersolvers.com ) has over 12 years of experience in career management, recruiting, and executive coaching. Ms. Safani partners with both Fortune 100 companies and individuals to deliver targeted programs focusing on resume development, job search strategies, networking, interviewing, salary negotiation skills, and online identity management.
Article Source: ArticlesNetwork.com