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Fox Interactive Media Research: Social Networks Are A Good Advertising Platform

The results are in from Fox Interactive Media's study that examined the growth and marketing power of online social networks, and the news is good. The study was conducted in partnership with Isobar and Carat USA and considered feedback from about 3,000 U.S. Internet users and MySpace clients.

The study points out some very important points, such as more than 70% of Americans in the age bracked 15-34 are actively using social networks, that a lot of this usage is taking place during 'prime-time hours', and that it is helping companies initiate 'meaningful brand connections' with the users.

Furthermore, the research expounds on the marketing opportunities that social networking sites are making available to advertisers. For example, 40% of these site's users said that they are actually using these sites to learn get more information about brands and products that they like.

Interestingly enough, the research also found that sports apparel manufacturer Adidas and video game developer Electronic Arts attributed more than 70% of their marketing return on investment to the "Momentum Effect", which is marketing-speak for how your brand propagates through a social network beyond the extent to which you advertise (i.e. word-of-mouth).

Marketing Evolution claims Adidas directly influenced 1.2 million people to purchase its product and, after those people talked to their friends, influenced 4.2 million more people. Similarly, EA directly influenced 1.8 million consumers and indirectly influenced 4.5 million consumers to say they intended to purchase its products.

With social-network-based advertisements offering a return on investment (value created or impact) that outstrips that of the average online advertising campaign and the overall average of televised ad-campaigns, there is no reason why you shouldn't have a social-networking-based marketing strategy.