What is the Value of a Tweet or Facebook Fan?

 Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, social networks, statistics  24 Responses »
Apr 282011
 

What is the value of a Facebook Like? What is the $$ figure for a Facebook Fan? What is a Twitter Follower worth? What is the value of a Tweet or reTweet?

Last week I bought a coupon for Zumba classes from one of the daily deal sites. I received a 50% discount but there was a catch. 1000 coupons had to be sold before the deal became active. Luckily, next to every deal on offer is a button that connects to Facebook. Click the Facebook “Like” button and all your Facebook friends and family and colleagues will see the special deal too. Within a couple of hours the 1000 coupons were sold out, by customers promoting the deal to other customers. My coupon came through and I will now actually have to go to Zumba classes! Activating social networks to sell your products or services is a brilliant idea – so shall we see what a tweet or Facebook fan is worth to businesses?

Recently, companies started to reveal the dollar value of sales made by customers who see a Facebook friend promoting a product. ChompOn, a daily deals group buying service similar to the one I used to buy Zumba tickets revealed that a Facebook share was worth $14 dollars each to them. That’s incredible. Every time a customer clicks the Like button, telling friends and family of the deal, ChompOn earns $14 in sales commission. But could this work for other companies?

Social conference company EventBrite found that an event, shared with Facebook friends, resulted in $2.52 worth of ticket sales per Facebook member “share”. Eventbrite doesn’t organise the events themselves – anyone can join and put an event online, Eventbrite handles the ticket payments and takes a small fee for the sale of that ticket. So $2.52 per ticket sold is a very nice revenue earner for Eventbrite, and they were able to raise $20 million in funding late last year.

Facebook “likes” also work for organisations such as Just Giving, a social fundraising service. You can create a webpage on their site and share it with friends to raise money for your favourite charity. They discovered that six “likes” are needed for one donation. and that one “like is worth around 8 dollars.

It seems to me that with hard statistics coming out now on the value of Facebook members “liking” products and services online, that we are becoming sales people for companies. Do you think that with our friends and family trusting us more than strangers, what we choose to “like” or not, will have a big impact on companies revenue in the future?

Here’s some statistics for you:
Continue reading »

Huffington Post Sells for $315m Social Media Revenue

 blogs, Online Communities, revenue, social media, social networks  24 Responses »
Feb 222011
 

I often write on social media revenue – how social media sites like blogs and forums and social networks monetize. One way is pretty simple – sell it! The Huffington Post just sold for $315m to AOL (America Online). How do you think AOL will make their money back from this blog?

Monetizing Online Communities

 Event, Monetization, Online Communities, social media, Social Media Australia, social networks  19 Responses »
Apr 072010
 

This is a presentation to ConnectNow in Sydney 2010. It’s really about “what is money” – the community requirements, how community uses money, that all money even “real” money is virtual. Social Media Monetization Connect Now View more presentations from Laurel Papworth. I’ll probably put more up once I actually GIVE the presentation. It’s just that I promise people at conferences that I’ll put the preso up on my blog and then I go to drinks and dinner and the next thing I know a week has passed and – the curse of timely content – the subject is dead.

Social Media Revenue: Huffington Post TechCrunch Valuations

 blogs, Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, social networks  27 Responses »
Jan 182010
 

Huffington Post and TechCrunch both have high valuations ($100m+). Yes, Virginia, social media and blogs CAN make money. Will 2010 see the further rise of social media proprietors? Something that continually gets asked of me at conferences and workshops is “Where’s the Money?”. It’s usually said in a tone that implies that social media is so gosh- darn “social” and “friendly” that everyone gives everything away for free. Which of course is just rubbish. Currency itself has no inherent value except what we, the community/nation, put on it. We value what we value – here’s the some of the revenue Continue Reading…

API Widget Economy: Social Media Business Podcast

 Featured, Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, Social Media Business, social networks  15 Responses »
Nov 032009
 

Episode 3 focusses on monetizing APIs and looking at revenue streams from widgets. Companies that open their business databases and stream that data out, can have an army of hundreds of thousands (mostly) unpaid developers creating Facebook apps, iPhone apps and blog widgets to help sell their products and services. Web 3.0 is “little bits everywhere” – don’t force customers to come to your site, let them do purchase your products on their site, where they are, and let their social network be informed. An overview of social media monetization revenues. Note: you can subscribe to video on iTunes and Continue Reading…

Donations as Revenue: Social Media Business Podcast

 Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, Social Media Business, social networks  15 Responses »
Oct 272009
 

Where is the money in social media? One of the 22 revenue streams is donations and a foundation stone of open source online community economies.

Experiential Economy: Social Media Business Podcast

 Online Communities, podcast, social media, Social Media Australia, Social Media Business, social networks  20 Responses »
Oct 152009
 

What is “the experience economy” – is it the next step on from agrarian, commodity, service…? How does value – and therefore money, currency – shift when people are more willing to pay for intangible experiences than physical goods? Can we monetize something in our minds? The first episode of my new podcast, Social Media Business, looks at revenue stream associated with providing your online community or social networks with a real world experience such as a meetup, conference or party.

Monetizing: Virtual Goods venture capital 2009

 Featured, Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, social networks, user generated content, web 2.0  12 Responses »
Jul 132009
 

Explanation of a bunch of virtual goods products and services companies, monetizing social media and social network activity, as a revenue stream or business model for online communities.

Monetization: Facebook Revenue and Business Model

 Featured, Monetization, Money, revenue  17 Responses »
Jul 132009
 

2009 July – Facebook to make $550 million this year. Various revenue streams and business models of Facebook and MySpace including virtual gifts.

Social Media Monetization: Craigslist hits $100m

 Monetization, Money, Online Communities, revenue, social media, social networks  16 Responses »
Jun 122009
 

Establishing revenue and monetization from free social media sites – Craigslist is hitting $100 million this year. Online Communities and Social Networks may yet show Rupert Murdoch a thing or two. Including the new rivers of gold?

Social Media Monetization and Revenue

 digital economy, Featured, Featured Articles, Monetization, Money, Online Communities, peer2peer, revenue, Social Media Australia, web 2.0  219 Responses »
Sep 272008
 

Presentation at PANPA (part) and WebDirections 2008 (full). This article is about the various social media monetization strategies and the powerpoint presentation (embedded) shows some case studies and examples, including social network size, the revenue streams, valuations and profits. Click for full size of Revenues for Social Networks diagram. REVENUE SOURCE: The X Axis (the horizontal one) is whether the money comes to you (you are the social network host or provider) from the members in the community or from external clients such as advertisers or sponsorship from companies. REVENUE FLOW: The Y Axis (vertical one) asks if the money Continue Reading…