Organization Name: Facebook Inc.
Industry: Social Networking
Web references: https://www.facebook.com/
The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that’s changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.
– Mark Zuckerberg, Chairman and CEO
Who are they?
Facebook is arguably the best known and most successful social media networking platform ever. With a monthly active user base of 1.32 billion users and annual revenue approaching $8 billion Facebook has a universal reach. Facebook has also used its wealth to acquire notable companies like Instagram, WhatsApp and Oculus VR.
Not surprisingly Facebook is also a global leader in the use of social media metrics to enhance both its user experience and its revenue reach. Facebook is not without controversy in this respect, the company mentality seems to be one of begging for forgiveness rather than ask for permission. In 2011 they had to settle with the Federal Trade Commission in a case where they admitted that they deceived users by failing to keep privacy promises. Long-term these questionable actions haven’t had a detrimental effect on the company and Facebook seems to have tempered the corporate arrogance that some have found distasteful.
The Facebook Social Metric Advantage
You would be hard pressed to find a private or public company that archives and processes more personal data than Facebook. The very nature of the Facebook application requires a minimum input of information from its users. And the vast majority of users are very social with their media, sharing preferences, vital stats and liking or commenting or sharing content that they are interested in.
The Facebook philosophy includes a strong belief in open sourcing, so a significant portion of what the company uses internally for metric measurement has been made available for use to advertisers. For a fee of course.
One of Facebook’s latest metric tools is Audience Insights. This tool allows advertisers to get granular when choosing a demographic to target. Some of the more unique metrics are Lifestyle, Job Title, Home Market Value and Purchase Behaviour.
Facebook advertising is a one stop shop. Users can create ads and campaigns to custom targeted audiences and generate reports that track conversions. The seemingly endless ways in which a product or service can be marketed is proof positive of how extensive the reach of Facebook is when it comes to data collection and social media metric utilization.
Submitted by: Richard Barrett, MOHLTC
Author Contact: info@hypergraphik.com
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References:
Facebook Wikipedia
Like or Unlike? Here Are Zuckerberg’s Answers to Users’ Questions