online trends august 2009

Some online drivers, observations & predictions

Björn Elmberg, Cybercom, August 2009

Agenda

• 2 core drivers

What’s behind Internet’s ever growing significance

• 7 highly personal observations

Where are we now, what trends are emerging, what

can we expect from 2009/2010

• 3 predictions

Some thoughts about the future

Two core drivers

”Technology is shifting the power away from the

editors, the publishers, the establishment, the media

elite. Now, it’s the people who are in control”

Rupert Murdoch, Wired Magazine 2006

Rupert Murdoch, Wired Magazine 2006

”Technology is shifting the power away from the

editors, the publishers, the establishment, the media

elite. Now, it’s the people who are in control”

Amaras law

We don’t like change. Technology has the

initiative. But the people make the momentum

Technology People

People are in control

• Dell hell -> Dell Idea storm

• Social media

• Freeconomics

• Long tail

• Folksonomy

• Brands on AdWords – open for everyone*

Advertising Age 2009-05-14

7 observations

1.

Web 3.0 is about context, structureand filtering (but not aboutmetadata)

• Search engines (Improved context)

– Google, Bing, Wolfram Alpha

• Aggregators and filters

– Friendfeed, intelligent RSS readers, Tweetdeck

• Personalization

– When will aftonbladet.se become intelligent?

The drivers behind web 3.0

We will never be able to agree on one, common

framework for categorizing Internet content.

And we will not be thorough enough to categorize

everything. Always.

Thank god for search engines

The semantic web is utopian

2.

Augmented reality. Our digital and real worlds are merging

2009-09-21 e.g. name of the presenter18

2009-09-21 e.g. name of the presenter20

3.

Integrity online – we are not actingcoherently

On one hand, we are really engaging ourselves for integrity and the

right to stay anonymous online…

“You can make money

without doing evil.”

http://www.google.com/corporate/tenthings.html

…on the other hand we happily provide Google with information about

where we surf, what we mail, what we search etc etc. And for every

new content-related company Google buys we get happier.

• Gmail

• Google Wave

• Google Calendar

• YouTube

• Google Maps

• Google Docs

• Blogger

• Google Reader

• and of course… Google Search

• Google-controlled web trackers are tracking

users on 92 of the net's top 100 sites and about

88 per cent of almost 400,000 other domains

• 46 of the top 50 websites share data with their

affiliates

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/06/03/google_tracking_study/

Google Research has developed a prototype system that

uses a home computer’s microphone to:

• listen to the ambient audio in a room,

• determine what is being watched on TV

• and offer web-based supplemental information,

services and shopping contextual to each program

being watched

http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2006/06/interactive-tv-

conference-and-best.html

4.

”Facebook is underhyped”

http://www.torstensson.com/weblog/2009/06/hype-cycle.html

www.compete.com 2009-09-10

www.compete.com 2009-09-10

The world s most used website

• Average user has 120 friends on the site

• More than 100 million users log on to Facebook at

least once each day

• 6.7 billion people on the planet, 23.8 percent

(about 1.6 billion) have Internet access

• 8 percent regularly use Facebook.

• 92 percent of Internet users have yet to

discover it

Facebook

www.internetworldstats.com

www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

5.

”Twitter is overhyped”

http://www.torstensson.com/weblog/2009/06/hype-cycle.html

” Let's face it — Twitter is a fad. It has all the

attributes of a fad, including the one that people like

me don't get its appeal. It has risen quickly and it

will fall quickly. It's this year's Second Life”

Tom Davenport April 9, 2009

• 80% are followed by or follow at least one user. By comparison, only

60 to 65% of other online social networks' members had at least one

friend

• 36% of tweets mention a user in the form ‘@userhttp://www.danah.org/papers/TweetTweetRetweet.pdf

• 51% of people with Twitter accounts don't use it once a monthhttp://www.businessinsider.com/51-of-twitter-members-use-the-site-less-than-once-a-

month-clip-2009-5

• Among Twitter users, the median number of lifetime tweets per user

is one

• The top 10% of Twitter users accounted for over 90% of tweetshttp://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/06/new_twitter_research_men_follo.html

Twitter is a broadcasting channel

6.

Increased metric focus decreaseonline brand building

Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the

trouble is I don’t know which half

John Wanamaker, 1838 – 1922

• Search ads will represent 42 percent of all online

advertising spending in 2009, while display ads will

account for just 21 percent

• Internet advertising in Sweden is expected to drop during

2009, whereas Search Engine Marketing is expected to

increase with 12 percent

• Companies seek direct conversion rather than branding when

the marketing spend gets squeezed

From display advertising to action-driven advertising

http://www.emarketer.com 2009-06-17

http://www.irm-media.se/ 2009-06-17

• You optimize what you measure

• It is difficult to measure brand value

• Brand value is long-term, metrics are often short-

term

• Improved user experience can often drastically

improve brand attitudes

7.

The risk aversive conformitydisease

How many music and appstores can you spot?

Schibsted

• Viktklubb

• Tv.nu

• Tasteline

• E24.se

• Hitta.se

• Destination.se/Resdagboken

Bonnier

• GI Viktkoll

• Tv-planeten

• Recept.nu

• Va.se

• 118 100

• ?

1. Web 3.0 is about context, structure and filtering

2. Integrity online – we are not acting coherently

3. Augmented reality. Our digital and real worlds

are merging

4. Facebook is underhyped

5. Twitter is overhyped

6. Metric focus decrease online brand building

7. The risk aversive conformity disease

Summary

Outlook and speculations

Editorial and commercial content will become

increasingly blended and difficult to separate

– To attract younger audiences

– To increase ad revenues

– May generate new legislations

Advertising

Brand advertising

There will be some kind of new advertising model not

yet invented

– Performance-based, but less tied to action and more

towards brand impression and engagement

– Pinstorm - A pure, pay-for-performance digital

advertising firm.

– VideoEgg – Cost per engagement

Conformity disease

An opportunity lies for those who dare to be

different, to stand out

– Limited economies of scale

– Attention economy increasingly valid

– We want to be entertained

– We live in exponential times, the viral effect is

spreading and increasing, ”the viral long tail”

Augmented reality

Applications that help to seamlessly integrate

our online and offline lives will be initially hyped

and then increasingly common

bjorn.elmberg@cybercomgroup.com

+46-70-915 31 82