Conclusiones del informe:
"The social networking phenomenon is dramatically changing the way people behave and, consequently, offers new challenges and opportunities to the global media and advertising industry alike. Social network and blogging sites now account for almost 10% of all Internet time yet remains, with a few exceptions, a largely un-monetised form of media. The industry is still in its infancy in regards to successfully adapting its traditional ‘modus operandi’ to take advantage of this fundamental change in consumer behaviour. Whilst social networks provide significant competition for traditional publishers in terms of consumer attention, they also provide significant opportunities. Publishers can improve engagement with their own audiences – by tapping into consumers’ increasing desire to create content – and can use social media to syndicate their content beyond its traditional confines to a much wider audience.
The Industry faces a huge predicament. The factors behind Facebook’s stunning growth – a focus on connecting through a simple and relatively advert-free design – haven’t attracted ad revenues consummate with the size and engagement levels of its audience. On the other hand, MySpace’s audience is flattening but its ad model – built around a richer content offering, more in line with traditional online publishing – is doing better at attracting ad revenues. A magic formula to overcome this predicament and effectively monetise online’s most heavily used sector, hasn’t yet been found. However, a major ingredient will be a fundamentally new approach to the online ad model in terms of both ad units and ad inventory.
This will involve a substantial trial and error process and is only achievable if the social networks, advertisers and their agencies work more closely together. Whatever the successful ad model turns out to be, the messaging will have to be authentic and humble, and built on the principle of a two-way conversation – not a push model – that adds value to the consumer. If this magic formula is found, the benefits could be truly incredible, having the potential to transform the potency of advertising across all forms of media to connect with target audiences and overcome the current distrust consumers have with advertising."
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