Publisher content key to keeping audience and luring real-time marketers
Twitter Canada announced Tuesday it has hired the Globe and Mail’s Steve Ladurantaye, who regularly covers media in Canada, to help orchestrate its partnerships with news and government organizations.
The appointment follows a string of hires made by social networks looking to deepen their relationships with publishers. LinkedIn’s executive editor Dan Roth, for example, was once the managing editor of Fortune, while Vadim Lavrusik, public content manager at Facebook, previously worked as a reporter and a professor at the Columbia School of Journalism. Vivian Schiller, chief digital office at NBC News, will likewise join Twitter in the U.S. this January, as head of news and journalism partnerships.
Each former journalist has a slightly different role within their respective companies, but the logic that brought them there is the same across the board: news matters for social networks. It’s the gas that keeps the engine running. Publisher content is what keeps consumers refreshing their timelines, maintaining the eyeballs they need to justify their rate cards.
In the past year, Facebook tripled the traffic it sent to publishers, a stream the company no doubt wants to continue feeding, which is why this week it announced it is tweaking its news feed algorithm to include more high quality news. By focusing on news, Facebook can also tout its real-time capabilities to advertisers who want to be in the moment with consumers as events happen.
With real-time marketing showing no signs of slowing, news will only become more important for social networks. And as they build their news initiatives, companies like Facebook and Twitter will look to media experts like Ladurantaye to guide them.
But don’t expect a cozy courtship without false starts and breakups. Some former reporters, like Lavrusik, who has been at Facebook for almost three years, seem to have found their footing, but several news initiatives at social networks have flat out failed. Last spring Tumblr shut down its Storyboard news blog and axed its team of editorial staffers within weeks of Dan Fletcher, once a social media director for Bloomberg News, leaving his position as managing editor Facebook and stating, “the company doesn’t need reporters.”
Pinterest wins at Cyber Monday
Pinterest drove a huge amount of traffic to retailers on Cyber Monday, one of the most important dates of the year for e-commerce sites. Compared to its 30-day average in the month leading up to the shopping holiday, Pinterest made more than triple the revenue for the retailers it sent traffic to on Cyber Monday. “[Pinterest users] are pinning to buy and they are going to Pinterest to look for products to buy. They thought of Pinterest as a destination for their holiday shopping circuit,” Piqora CEO Sharad Verma, who helps retailers market their products on visual sites like Pinterest and Instagram told Tech Crunch. “That never happened with F-commerce or Twitter, else we would have known it by now.”
Coke Zero took Metallica to Antarctica
Coke Zero took 19 winners of a Twitter contest to Antarctica as part of a event called “Música Zero” featuring a Metallica concert. The winners, who entered by sharing what they would be willing to do to win participate in the icy cruise ship trip on Twitter, will be treated to a 10-day cruise that culminates in Metallica playing a special headphones-only concert, powering the metal band down to a much quieter level in order to not disturb the local environment.
Harvey’s courts younger consumers on social media
Harvey’s is upping its social game in order to reach the young consumer base of many of its chief competitors in the quick-serve category. For it’s most recent campaign, the brand launched a series of four YouTube videos and asked consumers to “copyright” the topping combinations they like on their burgers – a key differentiator for the brand. To extend the concept, Harvey’s and its agency, BBDO Toronto, made Vine videos of some of the most popular and clever combinations. Check out the full campaign here.
The Numbers
The influence marketing software firm Augure recently published a study on CEO’s use of social media. The results proved that CEOs lack a social presence – falling far behind the rate of adoption for the general public.
30%
Executive directors at NASDAQ’s top 100 companies present on social media
72%
By comparison, of residents in the U.S. present on social media
23%
Executives on LinkedIn, the most popular social site for the c-suite
11%
Executives on Twitter
8%
Executives on Google+
5%
Executives on Facebook
