Is Facebook's Domination Over?

Facebook's UK unique user numbers have dropped for a second month in a row.

The fall to 8.3M unique users in February from Decembers 8.9M puts an end to the social network's rocket success. It had previously enjoyed 17 consecutive months of gains to the end of 2007.

Facebook had originally attributed a drop in January, to 8.5M, on the Christmas period. But the new provisional figures from Nielsen Online, released exclusively to NMA, reinforces the network's slowdown.

The figures also show that rival Bebo - which was bought by AOL for $850M (£417M) last week - is on the rise, jumping 13% to 4.6M.

Observers have warned that the dramatic rise of Facebook, which once planned to be the 'gateway to the web', is now over.

Alex Burnmaster, European internet analyst at Nielsen Online, said, The period of phenomenal growth for social networks is over. There's only so much they can grow and they've reached critical mass.

The figures reinforce media agencies' views that social audiences have experienced major swelling through hype but will settle into stable niche audiences.

Charlie McGee, managing partner at MEC Interaction, said...

They are very transient. You can never expect numbers to keep going up. It's interesting to see Facebook has lost users, but I'm not sure if it's going to damage ad sales.

Diffiniti's MD Rob Horler agreed...

The social network model is all about monetising core users so I don't think the shedding of numbers is a bad thing...

If in a few months we see the networks losing a quarter of their users, then they'll be in trouble, but for now this loss is sustainable.

MySpace, which claims to be the world's largest social network with 110M users, also continued to drop in the UK, falling to under 5M unique users in February.

But Jay Stevens, VP of sales and operations at MySpace, said...

We do look at traffic patterns but we define ourselves by user engagement levels. We look at logins, how many times that user comes to the site a day to check their email, watch a video or change their profile.

Facebook was unavailable for comment. Last month it released figures that claimed its 'active users' had risen to 8.3M, although this isn't considered a strandard measurement metric.

Facebook's Rise Over as User Numbers Drop Again.

Reference: New Media Age, 20.03.08

SPIWEB and milesBENNETT to Work Closer in 2008

After meeting in the middle of 2007 Iain and Miles have decided to work closer with their respective companies in 2008.

SPIWEB Consultancy focuses mainly on training users in how to make best use of their web analytics tools. With clients like NHS, Hackett, Jaeger, Butlins, Warner Breaks, NAVMAN and more, SPIWEB brings an impressive client list as well as specialist skills and not forgetting one of the best web analytics trainers in the Europe. SPIWEB’s director, Iain Murphy, is also a board member of the WAA Education committee and has contributed towards the University of British Columbia’s web analytics qualification.

milesBENNETT, with specialist knowledge in the financial services sector, has worked with banking groups like Grupo Santander, Barclays and the Royal Bank of Scotland. Miles Bennett has implemented the tools, worked with marketing managers to identify requirements and customised reporting to satisfy those needs. Miles Bennett helped bring awareness of the problems faced by financial services organisations at London’s eMetrics Summit in 2007. He is also a board member on the WAA International Committee and regularly arranges well attended presentations and events.

Their 2008 roadmap includes some impressive solutions to web analytics and internet strategy challenges. Providing a service to clients which will leave them feeling confident in using their web analytics tool and to have a direct influence on corporate strategy, marketing / cost effectiveness and most importantly the bottom line.

LinkedIn makes advance on UK

Business social network LinkedIn has outlined plans for its European expansion strategy.

A London office, the first outside the US, opens in two weeks as the site's European HQ as it looks to capitalise on social network boom.

Figures from Nielsen Online show LinkedIn was the fourth fastest growing social network in 2007, after Facebook, Perfspot and Imeem.

The London office will be headed by Kevin Eyres as European MD. He joins from travel site SideStep Europe, where he was MD.

Eyres said he was looking to appoint a marketing and sales team, as well as an ad sales house to sell across Europe. UK ad sales are currently handled by Ad2One, which holds the contract until March.

Last month LinkedIn began improving its user experience, including a redesigned home page and news section. It also joined Google's OpenSocial to allow developers to build applications for the site.

The network will continue to rely on viral marketing, as well as holding offline events; it's also making a drive to get existing members to use their accounts more.

A key part for me is to get early adopters back on the site, especially now that
the network has grown so much. There's much more of a reason to be active, said
Eyres.

LinkedIn first revealed plans for a UK office after amassing 1m members in the UK without a formal presence (NMA 15.11.07)
Reference: New Media Age, 24.01.08

Web Analytics, Defined?

What do businesses perceive web analytics to be? Some organizations classify it as a marketing role and others classify it as an IT role.

However, very few organizations view this as a strategy input role.

Web Analysts provide both sales information telling an organization how much bottom line value is been driven from the website. They are also providing strategic information which is largely unavailable in retail outlets. If we take the example that a retail outlet measures everyone that comes into the store (known as footfall) then we measure how many sales are sold in the same period. From this we can also look at average sales value, most popular products and finally the cost of point-of-sale advertising.

What we cannot measure regularly is the efficiency of the sale. The time taken to complete the sale, where people leave in the sales funnel (in retail outlets a long queue could mean that sale is lost and potentially future sales also lost).

Web analysts (with proper training) can provide recommendations, monitor the changes made to the web process and then analyse whether the improvement was a success or failure. To quote Jim Sterne (Target Marketing, EMetrics and the Web Analytics Association) – “Test Measure Test Measure” is the best way to ensure that not only do your customers buy, but that they also come back.

SPIWEB offers consultancy services to companies who want exactly this. A streamlined sales process, efficient customer registration and ultimately, an increase in the bottom line.

Why you should become a contractor

There is a drastic shortage of internet marketing and analytics trained staff. Companies are trying to recruit web analyst and marketing staff left right and center. As a web analytics professional I receive an average of five calls a day.

The “New Business” magazine has recently written an article of skilled labour and how targeted training can boost bottom line performance, productivity and the sense of worth a staff member gets from a company’s investment.

Between 1996 and 2002 the University of Kent researched 2,000 small companies. In that time 11% of those that did some staff training went out of business and 27% of those that did no training went out of business.

What are the reasons that people don’t train their staff? Some quote time and others quote resources (including money).

“New Business” states that “training does not have to be expensive, especially with the many government initiatives currently available. It does not even have to eat into valuable work hours.” If the case is such then could it be that the managers are not explaining the benefits of training and development to their staff?
In SPIWEB’s opinion people should have structured training which involves the staff member as well as management and it shouldn’t always be strictly tied to company objectives.

• Review the job objectives
• Question what the staff member wants to do
• Confirm the best way forward (e.g. internal/external training
• Setup regular review points

The need for the review is to measure whether there was a requirement to change the programme.

"Either in the mistaken belief that a technical specialist can somehow bring the team along as a manager by strength of technical excellence alone, or because the renumeration and reward system do not allow for the growth of an individual’s personal wealth and status without the need to become a ‘manager’, or even because companies have not put in place processes for identifying the nuturing good managers.”

Turning Strategy Into Reality – Rossmore Group - 2003

If we go back to the original question – “Where are they?” – chances are they are already in your organization. You just need to see past what you know of people and see what they are capable of.

Government Loses Customer Details - How Safe Is The Web?

I'm sure by now everyone has heard about the recent British Government lapse in attention to detail with the loss of some 25 Million UK citizen details becoming 'lost' in the ever so reliable postal service. There are some people who think the internet is not such a safe place to shop because their identity can be 'stolen' and used illegally, but surely this recent mis-hap by the British Government highlights even further how vunerable we really are without ever going near a computer.

Consumers who are thinking of buying this coming seasons Christmas Presents can be sure, their details will be kept safe if they follow a few simple steps.

1. Check that you have in the address bar of the web browser https and not a http (this indicates you are in a secure session and usually high levels of encryption are provided so you can be sure your details are scrambled so they do not make sense to anyone but the web site you are entering them on, once you have entered them).

2. Check you have the padlock symbol in the bottom of your web browser window. Usually the style you would probbaly use on your shed to keep it locked when not using it.

3. Check your privacy options and see who is monitoring you. Web browsers will report what technologies are watching what you are doing. In IE (Internet Explorer), go to View, Web Page Privacy Report and look at the Summary.

Also, be aware of pop up windows. It a site uses lots of pop up windows (usually more than one at a time), I tend to leave the site as that indicates something called spyware where someone somewhere is capturing your details if ever clicked on. You do not want spyware to remain on your computer as this is how some sites can capture more personal details over time (i.e. your email address, telephone number, credit card details and more).

You can usually download popular and free anti-spyware tools from the internet. Just go to your favourite search engine and type in 'Antispyware' to get more information; Google UK returns over 11 Million search results in 0.11seconds...Impressive!

Web Site Measures

Everyone wants to use HITS as a way of measuring site performance. Understandable, after all, it was a buzz word used in the mid 1990's!

However, HITS does not mean a great deal when it comes to measuring web site performance. HITS has become an acronym; H.I.T.S = How Idiots Track Success. How very appropriate, for HITS mean nothing more than the number of files that have loaded on your web site. These 'files' could be graphics, downloads (pdf's, zip files and more) and pages. So, comparing site performance using HITS means nothing more than measuring the number of files downloaded, it doesn't mean how many orders, how much revenue, how many subscriptions, registered users and more. In other words, HITS is a rubbish way of measuring site performance, or is it? HITS has its place and can be useful but only if the business understands how it should be used. From experience, it is just best avoided.

So, how do you measure site performance? Well, there are other 'Industry Standard' metrics you could use. How about Visits? How about Page Impressions? Length of Visit? They're all good starting blocks but ultimately the best measure to use is one that has not yet been created. This is something SPIWEB covers in its KPI workshops; allowing business professionals to work out what their KPI's (Key Performance Indicators) should be. Typically, business users come up with a list as long as their arm once they have done this workshop but what it allows users to do is get those indicators which work best for their business model.

So, in closing, HITS is best left alone, let it sit on the fence and watch in awe as far as a KPI is concerned. Use HITS to measure site performance at your peril. There are better ones to be had, they just need discovering!