5 Digital Trends in 2017

As we close off 2016 and reflect upon the year, we also try to look ahead into 2017 hoping that everything will be good in the digital space. For the record, I’m not someone who is an expert in spotting trends, but these are some things I feel will make an impact in the digital landscape in the coming year.

The Rise of Chat-bots

Chatbots are starting to gain some momentum among brands, especially those who manage customer service. The aim chat-bots is to free up the resource needed when answering day-to-day FAQs through automation when it comes to providing troubleshooting matters. However, chat-bots are still at an infancy stage. They still lack the “human touch” in terms of being able to communicate the same message differently to different audiences and they also can’t distinguish sarcasm as well. But I have a feeling that in 2017 more and more brands will start to explore and experiment with chat-bots and how it can help customer service.

Find out more about some best chat-bots around

Big(ger) Data

We all know by now the importance of data and the overused term “big data”. Often than not, marketers are only scratching the surface of how they can use all that collected data. But the more we dwell deeper into all that data and complex analytics, we hope to derive cognitive insights into helping us understand and predict user behavior. This would then benefit marketers in making better decisions during campaign planning and targeting of relevant messages more efficiently. 2017 will see more brands and companies relying on data and analytics to drive their businesses.

VR / AR

Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) have been around for quite a while. Companies like Layar, which allow brands to leverage its services to develop AR based engagement, have been around since 2010. However, 2016 saw the people at Niantic Labs (creators of Pokémon Go and Ingress) took AR to the next level, making Pokémon Go the most played game app ever. Meanwhile Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook gave the world a glimpse of how the future of Virtual Reality will look like during their Oculus Connect event back in October. Perhaps these 2 milestones will set the tone on what is to come in 2017 in both AR and VR worlds.

360 Videos & Live Streaming Videos via Facebook

It’s not very uncommon now to see brands leveraging on 360 videos and live streaming of events on Facebook to promote brand messages. But I feel the adoption in emerging markets as well as smaller brands are slow because of the higher production cost needed for the equipment to create these videos. But as we move into 2017 however, I get a feeling that more of these equipment will be available at a more affordable prices (price reduction due to higher demand). Basic equipment that allows you to create 360 videos are now made available and affordable via crowdfunding sites such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter.

#TrueStory?

2016 was the year that “Fake news” made the news. Facebook was also accused of promoting fake news which has influenced the outcome of the US presidential election. However, Mark Zuckerberg has pledge to develop tools to combat fake news. In 2017, this would definitely impact what people think is a credible new source or otherwise. I feel that this would also have an impact on brands embarking on branded content or content association strategy. An interesting article on reddit.com talks about exactly how click-bait type article also co-relates with fake news.

** Disclaimer: All above are based entirely on my gut feel and that I won’t be responsible if these trends don’t actually happen. **

Facebook Canvas: What does this mean for other mobile rich media ads?

Last week, Facebook announced the launch of its new ad unit called Canvas, a full screened rich media ad unit capable of delivering high impact experience on mobile. While many say that it’s cool and what not, I say “It’s about time, Facebook!” This is not exactly something new if you’ve dabbled into creating mobile rich media ads before. Mobile rich media ads have been around for at least the past 5 years or so, or when HTML5 was first introduced. It enables ads to be interactive and engaging with the use of video and multiple functions.

(image via siecledigital.fr)

To explain this to the layman, I normally say it’s an ad unit that expands full screen to show a micro-site of your brand. It is used to tell a story of your brand / product / service by creating different pages and different functions to drive home the points.

Facebook Canvas vs Mobile Rich Media Ads

To be honest, I think both have its own strengths and weaknesses. The standard mobile rich media ads are design to run across mobile ad networks (which are outside of Facebook), meaning it can reach users on other long-tail sites other than Facebook. This works well if you want to reach an audience who are not necessarily on Facebook (think China). The key challenge for ad networks are of course the visibility of your ads to the audience, since most are running on bidding inventory and limited screen real estate.

On the other hand, Facebook Canvas is native to the app to provide the user a seamless experience when browsing through the timeline. Facebook of course have one major advantage….data. When they launched Facebook Reactions, its primary goal was to gather richer data from users (You can read more about it here). This means the Facebook Canvas ads are able to be micro targeted based on Facebook’s already rich data filters. Not to mentioned, how targeted the ad can be if you include your own set of data through Custom Audiences.

So which is better?

I would say, rich media mobile ads still plays an important role beyond Facebook. I’ve seen mobile rich media ads that can take advantage of mobile phone functions such as camera, gyroscope, voice functions and GPS to create a more personalized and engaging experience. I don’t think for now that Facebook Canvas is able to do that (or not yet at least). The main advantage that Facebook Canvas has is probably the richness of its targeting capabilities.

So before you decide to jump on the band wagon of creating ads using Facebook Canvas, it’s important to ask what is its main objective. For me at least, Facebook Canvas works well with brands that has e-commerce presence (works well as it offloads mobile traffic on e-commerce sites), telling a brand story and brand building. These ads does not necessarily require a lot of interaction with the user, but yet informative enough with a strong call to action.

If you want your ads to be more interactive and fun, then go for mobile rich media ads as it is able to leverage of mobile phone functionalities. End of the day, it also depends on where and who you want to reach out to.

Fan-gating - Yay or Nay?

I'm sure many of you would have come across similar imagery to the one above when you're on Facebook brand pages. This is call fan-gating. The reason why many brands do it is to get more people to Like their brand / page. I'm against the idea that brands need to fan-gate especially if it's a contest by the brand. I feel that people should be able to participate freely, but not necessarily like your brand / page.

Speaking from an ethics point of view, personally I feel it's not right. Why do you need to Like the brand before joining a contest? If your brand sucks, it sucks and that is the perception that the brand would need to fix though marketing efforts or PR, but definitely not forcing people who do not believe in the brand to Like the brand.

I am against this is because someone who Likes your page for the purpose of joining a contest or for the purpose of any promotional offer, is not a quality fan. They would most likely tend forget, Unlike, or won't engage with your brand anymore once the contest / offer period is over. Why would this matter you ask? Well, simply put it in terms of advertising dollars. How much would you pay to get a non-quality fan versus a quality fan?

At the end of the day, the idea of having brand pages is all about having long term engagements with quality fans. Think about it. Would you rather have 5,000 fans with 1% engagement rate, or would you rather have 100,000 fans with 1% engagement rate? What then happened to the advertising dollars spent on getting those fans? The development cost for the application to run that contest? Would it be money well spent if your goal was to grow fans by fan-gating then? Maybe not. Similar to respect, Likes should be earned and not forced upon.

What do you think? Should brands fan-gate?

Online Privacy: Some Ways To Protect Yourself

Some joked that the Internet (or WiFi) is now part of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, which is true to certain extend if your work actually involves you accessing the internet on a daily basis. While the internet is great, it does have a darker side to it.

Online privacy has become a major issue in the past few years or so. Simply because people are ignorant, and not many people even know what it actually means. In layman terms, if your online privacy settings are weak or set to "default", most of your personal information from websites you visit, from social media content you consume on Facebook, Twitter, etc becomes public information.

Recently, there was a case of a website showcasing a collection of photos of girls (some of which are almost nude) to which most of them are underage. It's shocking because these girls innocently upload their photos on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, without realizing that once it's up, it's available to the public. When I refer to public here means anyone (not necessary someone you're friends with or know) will be able to save your photo or use it for malicious intend. You can read about the full story here.

In a recent article from Social Media Today, you can see that 67% of Facebook users check their privacy settings only once a year or never at all, and that 50% never ever used the "View As.." function to know how others view your profile (I'm sure some of you don't even know that this feature exist on Facebook right?).

Photo credit: socialmediatoday.com

Another thing about photos being uploaded on the internet, they do carry location information of where the picture was taken if you use a mobile device. There used to be a site called icanstalku.com (service now disabled) which you can upload a photo and they can show you exactly where the picture was taken. This is possible because mobile devices allows location services where you would use it for apps like maps and check-ins (Facebook & Foursquare). This will allow wannabe stalkers to know which places you usually frequent and plan their "attack".

Be vigilant!

Do remember, while the internet is great, there are some steps that you can take to minimize the abuse of cyber stalkers.

1. Review you Facebook privacy settings. Create groups and permissions of who gets to see what content and photos. For me, I only allow friends or people I know well enough to view my photos. To acquaintances, I only allow them to view selected updates. Once you created the groups, read this: https://www.facebook.com/help/120939471321735 on how to select who to view what content.
2. It does not mean that you have to change your profiles to "protected / private" mode. What I post on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are very different. I post photos of my family and friends on Facebook simply because I have privacy and permission settings to control who views them. As for Twitter and Instagram, I chose not to post photos of my family simply because I would like these profiles to remain public and I wouldn't want the public to start stealing photos especially that of my family members.
3. Be careful of "Check Ins". "Checking-in" can be fun (especially on Foursquare), but it can also be dangerous. Only allow people you know and trust know where you are. The easiest way to avoid this is by looking through your Foursquare friend list. Remove anyone who you think you do not know well enough as a precaution. Only add friends who you know.
4. Blogging only of the past. I know this is something rather hard for people to do especially if they are going to an exciting destination or some place really nice. But think about it, if I want to take advantage of that, all I have to do is to read where you will be going and on what date and time in order for me to plan my "attack". In my view, if you must blog about it, limit the information about date, time and with who for security reasons. The best is to only blog about past events to avoid the hassle.
5. Check your privacy / security settings regularly. As services like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram changes their privacy policy from time to time (and they don't usually inform users until someone discovers it), it is important to always check your privacy settings from regularly. Checking once every 2-3 months would be a good habit. 

Facebook Set To Revolutionize The Internet

The "Open Graph"

Facebook recently announced the launch of new “social plug-ins” at the f8 conference that will revolutionize the internet and how people are connected to it. Mark Zuckerberg talked about how Facebook intends to connect parts of the Web that other social sites are building, as part of what he described as the "Open Graph." People are increasingly discovering information not just through links to web pages but also from the people and things they care about and through their experiences. Facebook has always been focused on mapping out the part of the graph around people and their relationships. On the other hand, other sites and services have been mapping out other parts of the graph so users can get relevant information about different types of things.

Imagine this: Yelp maps out the content based on businesses and services while Pandora maps out which songs are related to each other. Facebook now helps bring your friends from Facebook to share experiences on these sites or personalize them to you. So if say you liked a song you heard on Pandora, or say you liked a service that aided you on Yelp, you can now tell your friends on Facebook about it by simply clicking on the “like” button on the site and it will appear to your friends as part of your “News Feed”.

With the new social plug-ins, brands would now be able to gauge how well their products and services are doing in terms of public reaction to the number of “likes” or “recommends”. One sample implementation is on CNN.com, where you can see which of your friends “liked” which article from the site.

CNN.com now includes Facebook's Open Graph

Noticed the “Friend’s Activity” section highlighted? Those are actually people I know from my Facebook friend list who have “liked” certain articles within CNN.com. This serves as some sort of “recommender” to people on what to read or what to do, assuming it’s their first time to a particular website. Zuckerberg himself mentioned that the new changes announced constituted "the most transformative thing we've ever done for the web." …well how true indeed. 

For more information:
Mark Zuckerberg during f8 Live
Available Facebook “Social Plug-ins”

Don’t Use Social Media If You Don’t Know How

In today’s digital world, online presence has become a necessity in order for companies to survive and to reach out to their customers and clients. Social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter has provided everyone with a platform to do just that. As with everything else, there is always a tendency for companies to want to use these tools, simply because it’s the current “in thing” and that everybody is doing it.

Based on my personal experiences, many companies here come to me to ask if I can incorporate these tools as part of their online marketing strategy, but they have no clue whatsoever on how these tools function. My job is to educate them on how these tools work and how it will benefit their company. The first question I always ask my clients, “Who is going to maintain it?” Often times, I will get blank stares from them as though that I’m speaking in some foreign language. But the truth is, unless there is an appointed PR company or a qualified spokesperson from within the company to manage and maintain the use of these tools, I wouldn’t recommend companies venturing into them as yet. Here are 3 reasons why:

1. Tools such as Facebook pages and Twitter require constant interaction between companies and their customers. The whole idea of using these tools is to add a “human touch” to the company or brand. Unless of course you have an automated robot intelligent enough to answer questions and respond to each customer directly.
2. Updates. One major use of Facebook pages and Twitter is to push promotions and updates to your followers. If the page is just there for the sake of being there, followers will get disinterested very quickly just like how no one likes visiting a website that hasn’t been updated in a long time.
3. Being professional. I have personally seen some companies on Twitter that often times respond to their customers with lame jokes and casual conversations totally irrelevant to the nature of business. In my opinion, while I agree that companies need to provide a “human” response rather than a template one, they also need to know where to draw the line. Responding to questions casually is still acceptable, but it’s totally unacceptable if it’s got nothing to do with the company product, service or whatever they are set out to achieve. Companies need to know their boundaries on how they respond as it represents the company or their brand as a whole. Which is why I highlighted that it’s very important that these tools are managed by a qualified person who understands clearly of what the company’s objectives are and how they want the public to perceive them.

To sum it all up, my advice is not to venture into social media just because everyone else is doing it. I think companies who are serious into social media must first know how to use it and understand the mechanics of how it works. Only then, social media will be beneficial to the company, otherwise few months down the road, they will be wondering why is there no ROI or participation from the public even after using these social media tools.