There are more than 500 million people on Facebook and Hip Digital Media wants to give them credit. Specifically, Facebook Credits.
The digital content promotions company, which has five North American offices, recently added Facebook Credits to the large menu of promotional tools it offers its clients and their brands.
Consumers can use Facebook Credits as digital currency within applications or games on Facebook. For example, the credits can be used within Facebook to buy e-greeting cards or, if the mood strikes, a virtual pet.
Brad Josling, vice-president of sales at Hip Digital, said while the company was originally founded on music licensing, its mission is to license and distribute any content that’s valuable to consumers. Offering Facebook Credits, he said, is one of the first moves outside of music that Hip Digital has made.
He points to the booming social gaming industry as an example; Josling said there are about 250 million-plus people playing social games, such as Farmville, per month. And, as of July 1, Facebook Credits are the only currency players will be able to use on Facebook.
In terms of parlaying the power of the Facebook brand into stores, Hip Digital has a license to put the Facebook Credits logo on-pack. This should work well with the social gamer demographic. Josling said the average age of the social gamer is 43, and players skew female. The biggest category is married women with kids. “They’re playing these games on Facebook as their social activity with their friends and also their kids,” said Josling. And when that mom and her kids are strolling down a shopping aisle, they’ll both identify with a Facebook Credits logo on packaging.
For example, global consumer electronics company Dane-Elec will offer Facebook Credits on a USB drive that will be available in Target stores for the back-to-school timeframe. It’s a value-add offering that allows consumers to get 10 Facebook Credits or five song downloads, said Sherry Chapman, director of marketing at global consumer electronics company Dane-Elec.
The company chose Facebook Credits for its promotional tool in this case because “you have to be in line with what is popular and pop culture when you’re selling to the masses,” said Chapman.
In addition to helping products stand out on the shelf by affiliating with the hugely popular social networking brand, another marketing-related note about Facebook Credits is that people purchasing them tend to be very micro-transaction driven, said Josling. “About half of the purchases of Facebook Credits are a dollar or less, so you don’t have to give away a lot of Facebook Credits for it to be a very high perceived value from a consumer standpoint,” he said.
Josling says Hip Digital is currently working on about 10 to 15 deals involving Facebook Credits.
And, in the more immediate future, Hip Digital is presenting an exclusive panel called ‘Brand Loyalty 3.0’ at North By Northeast (NXNE) on Thursday afternoon. The panel, which will feature representatives from companies including Sony Music, Aeroplan and Quizative, will cover how digital content marketing helps prompt consumer behaviour and build brand loyalty.
