Online Information 2008 – day one: How Microsoft does it?
Posted by popkitchen | Filed under web 2.0
Mel Carson, AdCentre Community Manager, visited OI to talk about Microsoft AdCentre and how it supports advertisers with its tools and info, enabling them to appear on MSN-affiliated sites.
He also quoted the research on social media, the fact that the social networking practices in Europe rose by 35% alone last year. Apparently, Microsoft does not use AdCenter community for sales, but just for support and in the spirit of a real social community, it also serves as a place for requesting and offering feedback, posting beta versions and for helping advertisers help themselves (on a forum), thereby lowering the costs of support. Carson claims that within this community, you need to have an authentic approach, which is different from classic marketing/sales approach.
But on the other hand, Carson spoke about the usage of Facebook for creating a group on AdCenter community, he praised it as a good tool for sharing business info, even though someone in the audience stated that most people use FCB for personal reasons.
Btw. Microsoft is responsible for the contextual advertisements appearing on Facebook.
He concluded by saying that by engaging with social media you are able to disseminate information (and get feedback), gain insight on which you can plan your actions and it adds value to your business. This was very expected from someone in Microsoft to talk about community as a way of extending and strengthening the brand.
MS is one of the most outspoken companies advocating proprietary rights, so also interesting to see how they perceive community and what kind of sharing actually takes place there.
Tags: london, mel carson, microsoft adcentre, online information 2008, web 2.0
December 4th, 2008 at 10:45 am
Hi Jelena
Thanks for the write up! Microsoft Advertising sells some of the display advertising on FB but that’s not the reason we use the platform to reach our adcenter customers via its network.
Although the vast majority of FBookers are using it for personal use, an awful lot of people in our industry use it for business too.
Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter too: http://twitter.com/adcenterblog
Thanks Mel
December 4th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Mel, you’re online all the time:)
But you commenting here actually confirms everything you said on the seminar, interesting to know that a giant like Microsoft really engages with the users of social media.
I heard of people using Facebook for business - a guy has a consulting company and wants as many people to subscribe to his site, he puts every post (every lead to the post) on Facebook, visible to his 15000 friends. The same person also used FCB as recruitment tool, and it worked.
I am new to Twitter, but if Steven Fry is there, I am on!
December 5th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Make sure you follow us at: http://twitter.com/adcenterblog
December 8th, 2008 at 11:23 am
After Stephen Fry, Mel is the 2nd best reason to join Twitter!