Facebook

1. Introduction
The 2000s have developed an era of collaborative consumption, which is to increase the use of a good or service sharing, exchange, sale or lease of it. Last affected by this phenomenon: housing and tourism. We all heard about “couchsurfing” or “exchange of apartments or houses” and the society swears today more than Airbnb. The concept proposed by this site meets a real demand: it is to link individuals who want to rent their homes to supplement their ends with travelers seeking accommodation at lower prices. No wonder that this start-up in Silicon Valley has attracted over 4 million users in 192 countries worldwide. As I read through the case; I realize that Airbnb did not respond in a good way. However, how they reacted in the long-run was very smart. Indeed, they apologized and promised to strengthened their security for the safety of each customer.

2. Airbnb

Four million passengers have already tested the concept . The ads make the visitors dream : Prices also are attractive: 100 euros per night for a three – bedroom duplex terrace overlooking the Eiffel Tower. Cheaper than a room in a small hotel next door. Select, contact, and book: three clicks, it is done . ” We owe our success to our business model : the ad is free , we only take a commission at the time of the transaction ,” said Nicolas Ferrary . 3% paid by the host, 6 to 12% by the traveler. In crisis, Airbnb democratizes tourist rental . ” We rent our three-piece 750 euros per week , enough to pay a part of the holiday ,” explained Isabelle and Quentin . Like them, 35,000 “guests” in France – 15 000 Paris supplement their income by renting their couch , their guest room, their apartment or house. However, the site is sometimes more than just extra income. (Airbnb, 2013).

3. Social Media
Besides operating a host of social media channels, including Facebook, with 247,000 likes, Twitter, with over 140,000 followers, YouTube, with over 3,400 subscribers, and a company blog, Airbnb has successfully leveraged social media channels to promote the content they house on the site itself. Airbnb’s Twitter feed pushes out original content from their user base, including stories from renters on their experiences in new cities, local information that always includes link that takes followers directly to the Airbnb Neighborhood Guide page for that city. Contests are a great way to engage users, and Airbnb recently held a contest based on Instagram inspiration. Users were called upon to share photos that put a “cool, innovative twist on a summer cliché”, and then tag it “Airbnbfun.

The winner of the contest, who won a whopping $2000 travel credit with Airbnb, was featured on the brand’s Twitter stream, highlighting their penchant for personal communication. Along the lines of social media effectives and tactical promotion, Airbnb’s new Social Connections feature allows users to sync their Facebook accounts with their existing Airbnb account. Once connected, the tool shows if users’ friends have previously booked a place they are currently considering. This feature is particularly important because it taps into social currency and word-of-mouth recommendations, the most powerful drivers of online sharing and commerce. Using tailored search functionality, the Social Connections feature showcases the top-rated rentals within a user’s social network. Thus, users feel safer and more confident booking with Airbnb, knowing people in their social networks have endorsed certain spaces. 4. Establishing Trust and Security for consumers

Some researches show that Airbnb is increasing and developing some moves to make the consumers safer. There’s probably no company built more on the notion of trust than Airbnb. After all, you’re sharing lodging with a stranger. Today, the company is trying to turn some of that trust into a systematic certainty by rolling out a new security requirement. Airbnb is launching a page on its site for users to verify their accounts in two steps, both online and offline. For online verification, they need to verify their Facebook or LinkedIn pages. If they aren’t on either, they are required to point to three positive reviews from Airbnb. If they don’t have those, and aren’t Facebook or LinkedIn members, they can contact customer service to figure it out, says Jakob Kerr, Airbnb’s communications manager. As for offline verification, they need to scan their state-issued identification card, or confirm some personal info like entering the last four digits of their social security number or confirming a home address from years back. The idea is to pull away the veil of inauthenticity.

The thinking goes that it will put users at ease when browsing the site, and it will give owners peace of mind to know that people are accountable, and they are tied to their real personal information. For now, the verification process is mostly opt-in, though a random 25 percent of Airbnb users in the United States will be required to complete the verification before they can make reservations. Eventually, the goal is to get full participation, but Kerr says for now the company is rolling it out incrementally but plans to launch it internationally by year’s end. Of course, trust is a two-sided thing. By giving Airbnb scanned ID information, customers are implicitly trusting the company and its own security standards. “We understand we’re asking customers for more of their personal info,” says Kerr, but he continues, “We view trust as the fuel of the sharing economy as a whole.” (Airbnb, 2012) He promises all of the data will be encrypted, and only seen by a small number of Airbnb employees. He says those employees are regularly audited to ensure their integrity. It’s easy to see why a verified account would put users at ease. Airbnb has taken its lumps with trust and security issues in the past. The company first began to address concerns in in earnest in 2011, after a host reported a guest ransacked her home. Airbnb launched what the company called “Operation: Trust,” implementing new features like a 24-hour customer hotline. 5. The future of Airbnb

When I searched for additional information, I read that one of the goal of Airbnb was to expand in terms of core service they want to offer. Airbnb delivers personalized, local experiences, powered by the crowd. They provide that personalized experience at the local level of properties and experiences available to rent, but have an inventory that ps the globe. In fact, the New York Times has reported that Airbnb is putting 200,000 heads in beds per night, and they’re still in their formative years. It’s local and specialized, and often less expensive than hotels. (New York Times, 2011) The future state of Airbnb could go beyond just beds, disrupting eBay. This is a massive marketplace that can add any product mix that the crowd wants. I imagine the next natural phase for Airbnb is to help restaurants, local retailers, and artisans to provide services to guests at Airbnb facilities, and then to everyone else – all at the local level. Their main focus is crowdsourcing marketing. By listening to the customers’ demands, Airbnb will try to expand and offer the customers a “one stop” website where they don’t have to go from website to website to purchase different products but gather as many products or services as possible to ease the shopping experience for the customers.

Communication is what people do everyday; it is how people interact with each other, how they are able to form relationships, and how they are able to understand. However the way people communicate in the twenty-first century as a result of social networking sites has changed rapidly. Social networking sites have revolutionized the way people communicate . They have grown uncontrollably, with 98% of people aged 18-24 on social networking sites and an estimated 1.1billion users on Facebook alone, and it is currently the easiest way of staying in contact with friends and family (Social Networking Statistics, 2012). The first social networking site was SixDegrees.com and came out in 1997 , but because of the rapid development in technology, these sites are now widely accessible with 250million people accessing Facebook using smartphones (Social Networking Statistics, 2012). The Internet is mainly used as a source of education, and in today’s youth mostly as a way of communication.

Users of social networking sites are able to create personal profiles regardless of whether they are true or false, and are able to communicate with people around the world. Being able to create an online life can be dangerous; it can make people forget the priorities and the issues of real-life making them withdrawn and showing signs of addictive behavior, “This form of technology has the power to change the way we relate to our self and to others. It can change the way we think, what we believe, the nature of our sexuality and even our sense of identity” . However there is limited education, or awareness in place explaining the risks involved in social networking sites, leaving limited protection to the users of these sites. There are many benefits of social networking sites; unfortunately the dangers out way the benefits and it appears the negative effects social networking sites have on society are much greater then the positive effects. The main negative effects social networking sites have on society are cyber bullying, children being exposed to inappropriate online content and unwanted adult interactions.

However there are also many positive aspects of social networking sites and the positive effects they have on society. Firstly, social networking sites have made it easier for people to stay in contact with friends and family and keeping in-touch is now easier and more affordable. Users of social networking sites are able to create their own personal profiles to inform friends and family where they are currently studying, where they are working, and where they have been . Another benefit of social networking sites is social awareness. People are able to use social networking sites as a source of news and information, and are also able to create their own sites raising awareness to issues such as poverty, political rights and illness. Being able to create a page dedicated to certain issues can provide a sense of support and can make people more sympathetic and understanding of these issues (Dishman, 2012). The effects social networking sites have on society can be beneficial, but the risks and dangers of social networking sites are much greater and are happening more often then the positive outcomes. The first main negative effect social networking sites have on society is cyber bullying. Physical or mental, bullying is an issue people face all around the world. It can be destroying to ones mental health making them withdrawn, and can lead to depression (Litwiller & Brausch, 2013). Unfortunately due to social networking sites a new form of bullying called “Cyber bulling” has emerged throughout these sites.

There are an estimated 1.1billion people solely on Facebook, which means the opportunities for cyber bullying and the choice of victims is vast (Social Networking Statistics, 2012). Although bullying can happen to anyone, anywhere, before social networking sites bullying usually happened at schools and was in most cases controllable, because the teachers were able to patrol their students. However, bullying is now happening at home and there is limited ways of monitoring cyber bullying, as teachers cannot discipline their students if the bullying is occurring off school grounds, which can leave students feeling helpless (Karklins & Dalton, 2012). Another reason as to why cyber bullying is becoming an epidemic is because the bullies are unable to see the direct affect they are having on their victims, resulting in ”guilt free” bullying .

Also people may not realise that what may be a joke to them, could actually classify as bullying to another, words can be misinterpreted or taken out of context because there is no body language or facial expressions to coincide with what is being said. Cyber bullying should not be taken lightly, it can be destroying to ones life, leading to mental illnesses such as depression and eating disorders, and there has even been certain cases resulting in suicide (Litwiller & Brasch, 2013). However, there are actions users of social networking sites can take to protect themselves from cyber bullying, they can immediately block cyberbullies and make their profiles private, so only their chosen friends and family can view their information. Another issue social networking sites have on society is children being exposed to inappropriate online content.

The second main negative effect social networking sites have on society is children being exposed to inappropriate online content. Inappropriate online content can be sexual, violent, abusive, illegal, or discriminatory. This kind of inappropriate content can be damaging and it is suggested that exposure to this content can result in many negative effects such as desensitisation, aggressive behavior, and psychological trauma (Cho & Cheon, 2010). With many children now having access to social networking sites, inappropriate content can have a huge impact on their developing minds. Furthermore, if children produce inappropriate content and it contains any sexually explicit behavior of themselves or another minor and it is uploaded onto the Internet they can be charged with distribution of child porn and can become a registered sex offender with age providing limited protection (Lee & Crofts, 2013). The reason why inappropriate content is making its way online is that the Internet is easily accessible, and with social networking sites growing uncontrollably, and an estimated 70billion pieces of content uploaded onto Facebook every month, it is nearly impossible to patrol . Children who are using social networking sites need to be educated on the dangers posed by other people but also the dangers they pose to themselves. As well as the risk of children being exposed to inappropriate content, unwanted adult interaction is also an issue faced by many children using social networking sites.

The third main negative effect social networking sites have on society is unwanted adult interaction. Unwanted adult interaction is usually inappropriate interaction between a minor and an adult and can sometimes result in sexual assault. With limited protection put in place for minors using social networking sites, many do have a minimum age, MySpace has a minimum age of 13 and Facebook has a minimum age of 14, yet there is no age verification, meaning children can lie about there age (Heide & Sander, 2008). MySpace also has a default privacy setting for all minors. However this setting can easily be changed. With no social networking sites guaranteeing full protection against online predators, it can be a dangerous place for many children (Heide & Sander, 2008). Having no firm privacy in place to protect minors makes it easier for online predators to access personal information such as what school a child goes to, their “about me” section, and their photos (Heide & Sander, 2008). Online predators will prey on minors who have low self-esteem or seem vulnerable and will talk to them asking for intimate photos, or even arrange a meeting for sexual encounters.

Children who are victims of sexual assault can suffer mental illnesses such as post-dramatic stress, and or depression (Lee & Crofts, 2013). Many children on social networking sites are yet to form a self-awareness of the dangers they may come across, and are unable to detect inappropriate behavior (Heide & Sander, 2008). Therefore, there should be permanent privacy for all minors accessing social networking sites, to prevent unwanted adult interactions. Social networking sites are beneficial, but need to reform their privacy and education.

The main negative effects social networking sites have on society are cyber bullying, children being exposed to inappropriate online content and unwanted adult interactions. These issues are becoming more regular because social networking sites are growing rapidly making it difficult to control what is being put online. There are actions users of social networking sites can take to prevent these issues; unfortunately the damage has usually already been done (Karklins & Dalton, 2012). There is no moral reason as to why there should not be a higher form of privacy to protect minors who are using social networking sites. After all the children are the ones falling victim to most of these issues as they have yet to gain the experience and education that only age can bring. As social networking sites are already a part of most children’s lives, there needs to be a educational system that makes both the children and parent aware of the dangers and risks that social networking sites can bring. Even with all the positive effect social networking sites obtain, they will never be worth one child being a victim of sexual assault. Which still happens regardless of these sites, yet it has been made easier with these sites allowing children and unlawful adults to interact. In conclusion, it appears social networking site use is drastically in need of a reform, and formal education to minors also paramount in avoiding the inevitable negative effects of social networking sites.

References

1. Boyd, D., & Ellison, N. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 11.
2. Cho, C., & Cheon H. (2010). Children’s exposure to negative internet content: Effects of family content. Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, 49, 488-509.
3. Crofts, T., & Lee, M. (2013). ‘Sexting’, children and child pornography. The Sydney Law Review, 35(1), 85-106
4. Dishman, L. (2012). Social influencers who are changing the world through twitter. Retrieved from http://www.fastcompany.com/3004155/social-influencers-who-are-changing-world-through-twitter
5. Heide, V. & Sander, C. (2008). Social networking and sexual predators: The case for self-regulation. Hasting Communications and Law Journal, 31(1), 173-192.
6. Karklins, L & Dalton, D. (2012). Social networking and the dangers they pose to youth. Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 24(2), 205-222
7. Litwiller, B. & Brausch, A. (2013). Cyber bullying and physical bullying in
   adolescent suicide: The role of violent behavior and substance use. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 42(5), 675-684
8. Simmons, S. (2011). Social networking driving global awareness of news.
9. Social networking statistics. (2012). http://www.statisticbrain.com/social-networking-statistics/

This century is an era of globalization and with high technology and transformation.

As of 2011, one-third of the 2.26 billion of the world’s population are having internet access and this will be risen up to 40% by this year 2016 as projected by the Broadband Commission (Dron, J.; Anderson, T., 2014:3). The development of technology today and the integration of this modern technology into the learning process lead to educational evaluation and enhancement (Ataie F. et.al, 2015:47).

The impact of technology in the education of today is not new in the education process. The internet and other related technologies bring information, research, and literature directly to the classroom (Fewkes A. M.; McCabe M., 2012:93).

Technology gives the students free access to information and resources twenty-four hours in seven days (24/7), that enables them to create multimedia content and share it with the world, and that allows them to participate in online social networks and communities where people from all over the world share ideas, collaborate and learn new things (U.S. Department of Education, 2010).

Most of the students today are defined by their reliance on social media, their technological multitasking capabilities, and their propensity toward all things new (Mills N., 2011:345). The social media has become an integral part of modern society (Web Designer Depot staff, 2009) and also known as Web 2.0 (Dewing M., 2010; Cann A., Dimitriou K.; Hooley T., 2011).).

Social media are computer-mediated technologies that allow individuals, companies, NGOs, government, and other organizations to view, create, and share information, ideas, career interests, and another form of expression via virtual communities and networks (Wikipedia contributor, 2016).

There are many kinds of social media, social networking (Facebook), microblogging (Twitter), video sharing (YouTube), news aggregation (Google reader), social search (Google), and instant messaging (Yahoo! Messenger, Skype) (Zafarani, R., Abbasi, M. A., Liu, H., 2014).

These social media tools produce information every day (Cann A., Dimitriou K.; Hooley T., 2011; Al-Brahmi, W. M., Othman, M. S., Yusof, L. M., Musa, M. A., 2015:267) and provide a collaborative learning process by looking at the contributions of other students in the collaborative working space and by reflecting on their own contributions as well (Hopkins B., 2016, Balakrishnan, V., 2016:36).

Through social media the students are able to interact with one another, build a sense of community, develop content, as well as require students to be active in their own learning through participating, thinking, and contributing (Casey and Evans, 2011; Al-Brahmi, W. M., Othman, M. S., Yusof, L. M., Musa, M. A., 2015:265).

The students are able to upload their ideas on social media sites and receive feedback from others (Balakrishnan V., 2016:35). Social media become both media of formal and informal learning processes (Balakrishnan V., 2016:35). Collaboration becomes easy because social media makes connections and interaction of one another easily anytime, anywhere and it provides the chance to understand individuals and human behavioral patterns (Zafarani R. et.al, 2014).

Learning through social media with others, therefore, is an opportunity, Dron J.; Anderson T., 2014:9). Facebook specifically can be considered as a way of communication for learners to exchange information (Al-Brahmi, W. M., Othman, M. S., Yusof, L. M., Musa, M. A. 2015:266).

Facebook is a social networking service launched on February 4, 2004, and was founded by Mark Zuckerberg. He founded Facebook while studying psychology at Harvard University (Phillips, S., 2005). Facebook has gained extreme popularity among internet users over the past few years. This social network was intended for personal communication among individuals yet today many other organizations use it for their advantage (Alhomod, S. M., Shafi, M. M., 2012:52).

In the first quarter of 2015 Facebook revealed that it had more than 1.44 billion monthly active users (up 13 percent year-over-year). Of those, 1.25 billion were mobile users; an increase of 24 percent year over year (Protalinski, E., 2015). Facebook was the first social network to surpass 1 billion registered accounts and currently sits at 1.59 billion monthly active users (Statista site, 2016).

As of the fourth quarter of 2015, Facebook had 1.59 billion monthly active users. In the third quarter of 2012, the number of active Facebook users had surpassed 1 billion (Statista site, 2016). Mostly, people use Facebook for chatting, for sharing photos, for posting videos, for staying in touch and sharing personal news, plan meetings and get-together, do homework and business to gethers, find and contact long-lost friends and relatives (Collier, A., ; Magid, L., 2010:2).

For the young users, they use Facebook for day-to-day news about their friends, acquaintances, relatives, and peer groups, collaborating on schoolwork, validation or emotional support, self-expression and the identity exploration and formation that occurs in adolescent development (Collier, A., ; Magid, L., 2010:2).

There are a lot of studies already conducted to know the connection between Facebook and the educational process and these studies have established that Facebook can act as a tool of communication in the modern educational system (Alhomod, S. M., Shafi, M. M., 2012:52). Facebook, like a social network, provides positive impacts in the educational sector.

It creates a group or network, builds educational, integrates into current educational tools, and develops an educational application, shares topic information with other users of Facebook (Alhomod, S. M., ; Shafi, M. M., 2012:53). A recent study of the attitudes of 107 students toward Facebook provides some insights and this study found out that Facebook was preferred over eLearning Commons as a classroom supplement.

Many of the students were already familiar with Facebook, used it frequently, and found it easy to navigate (Barczyk, C.C.; Duncan, D.G., 2013:2). This means that one contribution of Facebook in the educational system is it serves as the source of knowledge and information outside the classroom where the formal education process is done. Furthermore, the study provided that if used appropriately, Facebook may help to increase student engagement by cultivating classroom community and stimulating intellectual discourse, (Barczyk, C.C.; Duncan, D.G., 2013:2).

This means that Facebook can be used effectively for academic discussions (Barczyk, C.C.; Duncan, D.G., 2013:2). Facebook enhances the learning process. This is the reason why most Facebook widely used by college students and colleges.

As we mentioned already, the students can upload videos, pictures, post to bulletin boards, and participate in communication via e-mail and instant messaging (Toland, R., 2013:41). Then Facebook is a social network that connects students with other students and creating an indirectly learning community which is vital components of the educational process (Toland, R., 2013:41).

Finally, Facebook can be used as a learning tool to develop the cognitive learning skills of the students (Toland, R., 2013:41).

How does collaboration happen in social media, on Facebook to be specific?

According to Cann A., Dimitriou K.; Hooley T. (2011) collaboration in social media involves an academic research cycle, namely:

1. Identification of knowledge,
2. Creation of knowledge,
3. Quality assurance of knowledge, and
4.  Dissemination of knowledge.

Cann A., Dimitriou K.; Hooley T. (2011) defined collaboration as the work of all the people who might be involved in research including researchers, librarians, funders and the general public. Identification of information in social media is possible because of the connection with other people.

Information also can be obtained through comments coming from the people you are connected through social media. The creation of knowledge is possible in social media through share ideas and/or advice coming from learned individuals.

Quality assurance of knowledge in social media is possible because of peer scrutiny and/or peer review. Dissemination of knowledge involves communication and/or engaging with the public and discussing related controversial issues.

Now more than ever, small businesses can promote themselves online by targeting customers and expanding their networks, often for little or no cost. Businesses can promote themselves through a variety of techniques such as targeting customers by demographics, contributing to online discussions and drawing attention to new services.

Advertising in the 21st century has become very versatile because of various online social websites like Facebook and Twitter, along with other blog atmosphere websites like Pinterest and Craigslist. In the last decade, the explosion of technological advances has produced unprecedented events in the history of mankind. One of them is the Internet and its conversion into a new medium for marketing and the use of social communication in advertising. Inevitably, the internet has changed our lives. In traditional media, newspapers, radio and television can cause information overload and change the perception of the audience (Janoschka, 2004).

The Internet is not exempt from this danger, but has the potential to do something different, because it can directly reach the target audience and interact with it. A function of memory is to forget, especially information that is not significant. The challenge of advertising is to make you remember the ads. The purpose is to sell. The good publicity convinces the viewer to buy the product. This requires creating an attractive brand image and strengthening it with each ad. Advertising employs both verbal and nonverbal elements that are composed to fill specific space and time formats determined by the sponsor.

Advertising reaches people through a channel of communication referred to as a medium. Today, technology enables advertising to reach its’ target audience efficiently through the Internet. In the 1990’s, the Internet became a major part of American society and is the fastest growing type of advertising. Its more than just banner ads, it means large format interactive ads, search-engine marketing, creating special promo videos for web download and supporting TV ads with online sites. Communication among people all over the world is effortless, and information on almost any topic is just a few keystrokes away. As a public global platform open to all kinds of information, entertainment, and communication, one of which is online advertising, it has become the latest mass medium. ” (Janoschka, 2004). Internet technology allows delivering the right message to the right person at the right time while helping advertisers to reach their audience. From the moment the surfer enters the web to search for information, pop ups appear allowing the audience to subscribe to mailing lists that will send continuous news, promotions, articles, etc. , depending on  their preferences.

This allows the seller to better reach its target and maintain continuous communication in the shortest time possible. Most online ads do not come to you as an individual, but by your interests in various subjects, your location or, in general, by your behavior during internet navigation. In most countries, it is possible to divide the audience by geographic area based on IP address, which facilitates advertising companies that offer products and services in those areas. Websites use demographic data to learn more their audience.

When registering with a portal or website, you normally provide certain personal information such as your age, gender, hobbies, etc. With this information, websites offer relevant content and advertisements based on the information provided. Some companies specialize in a data collection process known as behavioral advertising which matches ads to the interests of users based on their surfing habits. As users browse, advertisers collect data on their online activity: sites visited, time spent on each ad shown, ads that were clicked, when and how often you click on the banners.

Today, cookies are tools that allow advertisers to target advertising to specific audiences and segments. Compared with traditional media the cost of internet advertising is extremely low, and because of its effectiveness and its high potential for growth, it is ideal for small and medium businesses that do not have large resources to invest in other media.

Then the questions arise: how to advertise online? What is the correct way to? There is no magic formula that a media planner can you use but here are some suggestions. Due to the internet being global, the network gives the possibility to reach all audiences in the world.

With internet advertising one must include, email, search engine registration, and banners which are ads with motion graphics which are located in different sites of the network as a gateway input to a website. Using email as a form of advertisement is easy and free. All that is required is to sign up for email with your internet service provider or a free mail server such as Yahoo mail or Gmail and send emails to the potential customers with offers or information on products. According to Arens, “Google is the most popular destination on the web reaching an astonishing 40 percent of all Web users each day”.

Search engines are only responsible for registering portal websites and their content and then delivery the results to the users who made requests for information. The following is an example of how a search engine works. A user uses the search engine of their choice and asks to find companies that export tomatoes. The search engine will send in response with a list of websites of companies that fulfill the request and then the user can enter the different sites to see what they need and select the company that meets their requirements.

The banner system is one means of internet advertising that is more effective: You can choose the categories to be displayed and include descriptive words to detect if the user is looking for that particular product. The banners are similar to the rotating banner but the difference is that the user can interact with them. As in any project, internet advertising should begin by making a strategic plan. The result will be better planning of a website and the ability to maintain the user’s attention and customer loyalty.

The presence of internet advertising will be an excellent complement to traditional media advertising and may end up becoming one of the priorities of advertisers. For now, more and more ads in the media show the direction taken by advertisers along with customer care and other services of interest. User forums, blogs and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are invaluable resources for monitoring companies’ reputations and interests of consumers of services and products. Facebook is the largest social network in the world with more than 500 million people connected to each other. Facebook has not surpassed Yahoo! o be the second most popular site on the web behind Google. Facebook’s popularity has increased due to the ability to connect individuals without geographical barriers. The uniqueness of Facebook allows people to meet virtually to discuss and share their interests with each other (Arens, Schaefer, Weigold, 2011). There are 60 million status updates posted every day in over 65 languages. Facebook’s audience is far superior to any other mass medium like TV channels, radio or press Facebook has revolutionized advertising not only by the size of its audience, but also by the engineering behind its operation.

It allows an analytical and intelligent marketing to reach the precise target audience through market segmentation according to gender, age, geographic location, country, city and locality, educational level, likes, interests, product preferences, favorite activities, favorite programs and language. For example, it is now possible to know without extensive market research which countries have the largest number of youth between 18 and 35 years and who love rock music, football and a certain brand of beer.

Having a presence in social media is a must have for most brands. Facebook created Pages for businesses to post information about their services or products. When using a search engine, your Facebook Page will be one of the main results of your search. Consumers have tremendous power and influence on a brand and trust recommendations of other consumers they don’t know. According to Barefoot, “Groups and applications gain popularity one friend of a friend of a friend at a time” (Barefoot, pg 174).

The result is friends becoming fans or joining groups encouraging them to purchase a product or service that is being discussed or advertised. Twitter is still a very popular social media networking site, although adoption is declining. Compared to Facebook, Twitter has 50 million tweets created each day and the average Twitter account has an average of 300 followers. Social networking is important to marketers because it gives them the opportunity to show customers that they are listening to what they have to say about a brand or product and respond accordingly.

The possibilities are endless. It is common for organizations to provide direct consumer messages daily on Twitter, maintain a Facebook page, or depending on your industry also a profile on MySpace. Social networking has completely changed the way we communicate with each other. Everyone has a voice and an outlet to reach millions of people instantly with either Facebook or Twitter. The internet is an advertising medium with a great future because it is interactive can be customized or delivered to users according to their preferences.

There is immediate feedback and can communicate directly with users to resolve their doubts and concerns and with a global reach. The internet brings great potential for use in the field of marketing, market research, direct marketing, sales promotion, trade mail and, of course, advertising communication. As a society we must be prepared to confront and take advantage of the opportunities this new technology gives us.

References

1. Arens,W. , Schaefer, D. , & Weigold, M. (2012). Advertising. McGraw Hill Irwin. New York

This article was co-written with 

Our startup, hit an important milestone in June this year, when we reached US$1 million of sales on our peer-to-peer marketplace for secondhand things. For a small, not-very-well-funded startup, we are very proud of ourselves. We had no fancy marketing campaigns, no popup booths, no professional PR, no outdoor advertising, and only a limited PPI (pay per install) budget. What we do have is a product people love, which makes it possible for us to crowdsource customer acquisition.

First of all, it’s important to note that customer acquisition is not like brand marketing, where impressions and awareness are the key metrics. What counts in is when someone becomes a customer that generates revenue, or becomes a user of the product. For most early-stage startups, such as Melltoo, devoting resources to brand marketing is a luxury we cannot yet afford. Right now, what matters is growth that is quantifiable by revenue or users. This is not to say that brand marketing is irrelevant, but given our limited resources, brand marketing is not currently the priority.

What Worked Before Doesn’t Work Anymore

Customer acquisition strategies that were once successful in the past have been copied a lot, and many have lost their effectiveness over time. For example, cold emails (aka spam) to targeted users were very effective when Airbnb first automated this on Craigslist in 2009. Today, however, most people have trained their clients to recognize spam, and when these emails do land in the inbox, people delete them without so much as a glance.

The same can be said with social media. Startups assume that acquiring customers must be easy with platforms like Facebook and Instagram. But this is the case only if you can pay them. If you don’t have marketing budgets that rival your competitors, getting attention for your enterprise can be difficult. Organic reach on is pitiful, except in cases where you have a niche (aka small) audience that are actively seeking you out. However, if you are a mass consumer-facing product (the best kind to be in small markets like the GCC), trying to reach people organically on social media is like trying to get someone’s attention at a crowded party, while they are deep in conversation and the music is on at full-blast as well.

What about content and you ask? These options will only work if your content is truly unique and doesn’t exist elsewhere, and again, you need to appeal to niche audiences. It makes sense to devote resources to this if you are in the business of content, where content is your product; otherwise, you cannot compete with people who sell content. Just think of pitting your content against Michelle Phan and PewDiePie, or Entrepreneur and CNN.

As technology accelerates change in customer behavior, marketers are struggling to keep up. One thing is for sure: there is no one-size-fits-all marketing; every startup, every business, is different, and therefore, how you acquire customers must also be different. The best practices of the past don’t apply anymore. Today’s customer acquisition strategies are best crafted not by professional marketers, but by the people at the frontlines interacting with customers. Focus on what customers want, and craft your customer acquisition strategy accordingly. Acquire, convert, retain: you’ve no doubt heard of this paradigm before. Once you get the customer in the door, you’ve got to convert them to perform the desired action, and then you need to figure out a way to get them to come back. A good product and service is half the battle, onboarding is vital, and continued lowers your overall customer acquisition costs. This article discusses the first part of this funnel, getting customers into the door.

Crowdsourcing Customer Acquisition: What’s In It For Them?

The best advertising for startups is no advertising, because people are conditioned to ignore advertising. So unless your budget rivals Apple, you’re not going to get far. You might build brand recognition, but you won’t acquire customers. For startups, the most cost-effective way to get customers is through other customers. Think about it as crowdsourcing customer acquisition. Instead of paying and Google, figure out a way to “pay” your customers instead. Pay them with your product, which means your product better bring value or this won’t work. YouTube shares ad revenue with their content producers. Therefore, content producers are highly incentivized to get people onto YouTube. At the same time, YouTube also allows people to embed videos in external websites, which is akin to dropping breadcrumbs all over the internet for users to find. Website owners get value from this because they don’t have to write their own video streaming code, nor do they have to bear server costs of hosting videos. Another example is Facebook: I can’t think of many websites today that don’t let you sign up with Facebook. The Facebook login is an incredible user acquisition tool. You can’t avoid it, and you can’t ignore it. Why do developers use Facebook logins and promote Facebook for free? Because Facebook shares their user data with developers, and that’s how Facebook “pays” them.

At Melltoo, we make our customers our partners. By virtue of being a two-sided peer-to-peer marketplace, we benefit from network effects. Every new user that joins the marketplace adds value to the network as a whole, and thereby benefits individual users. Each additional buyer means sellers have a greater chance of selling quickly, and each additional seller means buyers have a greater chance of finding what they want at the right price. Hence, our customer acquisition strategy focuses on making our users partners in our network. Through Melltoo’s referral program, we incentivize users by rewarding referring and referred buyers with credit to purchase in-app, which in turn helps sellers sell faster. We further incentivize referring users if the friends they’ve referred to purchase or sell in-app by sharing a portion of the revenue with them. Every member of our network benefits and is highly motivated to grow the marketplace.

Psychology And Details Matter

To figure out what your customer acquisition strategy should look like, you need to understand what your users want, and how that can drive your business model. In other words, how can you “pay” users with your product (and not actual money), and still motivate them sufficiently? Customer psychology matters: you must think like your customers. All marketing messages are essentially calls to action, an attempt to get someone to do something. So whenever you put a out there, think about how a potential customer would react to it. The greatest objection to overcome is the “too-good-to-be-true-so-it-must-be-a-scam” syndrome. As startups, it is our modus operandi to build great products that are genuinely “too good to be true.” But be careful about marketing it in this way, because, well, nobody will believe you. Human psychology dictates that there is “no free ride in life,” and people expect to work for something, especially if it’s of value.

At Melltoo, our referral program is effective, because it requires users to work for it. Users have to refer their friends in exchange for free credit to be spent in-app. Referrals take a bit of effort since their friends have to sign up and get verified. In effect, giving referral credit is equivalent to giving users a discount when they purchase something. However, psychologically, having to “earn” referral credit makes it seem a lot more valuable than simply being given a discount (that everyone else is given as well). What’s more, seeing that free credit balance grow gives users a sense of ownership, like watching a bank balance grow. These factors may seem rather specific, but in the digital age, details matter more than ever before. In a time where everything is in sound bites and the average adult has a five-second attention p, details affect customer psychology, and they can work to either build, or destroy, trust and credibility.

Friction Is The Root Of All Churn: It’s All About The Flow

Details make or break customer acquisition strategies. If your strategy takes place digitally, then “the flow” or “the funnel” is where all the details are. What is the first thing that people see? What is the call to action? What happens when they click? Where do they go, what do they see next? What should they do next? What are they thinking along this entire process? The best way to figure this out is to get it tested out by other people. If you want people to do something, reduce the friction- like they say, stupid. Friction is at the root of all churn. If something is too difficult to do, you will confuse your audience and lose an opportunity to convert a customer. So when you design your customer acquisition strategy, break it down into baby steps, and make sure each step leads into the next one seamlessly. At each step, customers should have only two options: continue or quit. If there is more than one link or call to action at each step, you’re doing it wrong. Ideally, there shouldn’t even be many steps at all. And most importantly, when you finally get the customer into your “shop,” make sure he finds what he’s looking for and what you promised him he would find.

In our case, as soon as a new user successfully signs up, he gets AED20 in his Melltoo wallet, which is plainly visible on the main screen in-app. It’s not buried in his email inbox, and he never has to hunt for a coupon code. The free credit is applied automatically at the time of checkout, so the user can see exactly how much he saves. That AED20 thus hangs over his head throughout the app experience, which constantly reminds him that he has “hardearned” money to spend. This triggers the psychology of loss, (i.e. people hate to lose something more than they enjoyed gaining it to begin with) which motivates him to spend it in order not to lose it. After the customer makes the first effort of completing the signup process, he never has to think twice about it.

Look Forward Not Backwards

Startups are innovative, and yet, startup marketing often isn’t. Startups tend to fall back on tried and tested marketing strategies and find that they aren’t effective for them. This is unsurprising. Just as technology changes our daily lives, it changes our behavior as well. It changes how we respond to marketing messages and necessitates changes to marketing strategies. Today, the best startup marketing is done by people at the frontlines. Your people probably know how to acquire customers better than your marketing team does. By virtue of regular interaction with customers, customer service people know what customers want. Thus, to get started on crowdsourcing customer acquisition, start with what customers want, and then figure out how to give it to them.

Facebook is more than just the largest social-media platform on the planet. The Menlo Park, Calif.-based behemoth also uses its vast resources to help app developers make super-smart products.

If you haven’t already, say hello to . Since launching in 2015, more than 800,000 unique apps have used the service. And for good reason.

Facebook to the service’s growing stable of services. Leveraging demographics and rich audience insights from Facebook’s 1.7 billion users, the service offers developers a simple, streamlined way to understand the people who use their native mobile apps, desktop web and mobile web presences.

With that knowledge, developers can optimize the customer experience and reach them more effectively. Facebook Analytics for Apps goes beyond the usual stats like age and gender to provide anonymized and aggregated audience information including job titles, education level and even what Facebook Pages your customers like.

“Driving retention, engagement and conversion are important [for developers] and we wanted to lean on our expertise and infrastructure to help partners with the full set of growth tools,” says Facebook Product Manager Josh Twist.

“We have a saying to ‘think people, not devices,’” he continues. “If you’re not looking at a cross-platform picture to understand how individuals are using multiple devices then you’re not fully understanding user behavior.”

And it’s . You don’t need to use Facebook Login or any other of the company’s products to start developing smarter apps with Facebook Analytics for Apps.

Here, Twist talks about three tools within Facebook Analytics for Apps that highlight the service’s power to help developers create smarter apps and grow their businesses:

Cohorts: User retention is one of the most important parts of a developer’s growth strategy. As Twist says, “Without good retention you’re just pouring new customers into a leaky bath.”

The cohorts tool allows product teams to understand the retentive qualities of any event. For example, you can answer questions like “for a person who made a purchase in their first week as a user, how likely are they to return to the product in the following weeks?” Or, “how likely are they to make another purchase?”

“You can see this data by cohort which allows you to see how changes you make to your app are improving your retention over time,” Twist says. With cohorts, you also can see how the lifetime value of customers improves as you make improvements to your product.

Funnels: For product teams, funnels is a common concept that helps them understand how customers are moving through their key processes, such as registration, completing a share or checking out.

“With the introduction of cross-platform analytics, we can help you understand how individuals are moving through these processes across multiple devices,” Twist explains. “By understanding where people drop off or struggle in your funnel, you can test improvements to your product experience at those specific points and help improve conversion.”

The funnels tool also shows whom among your customers searched on your iOS or Android app but checked out on the Web. This data can be critical for business owners so that they can allocate resources more intelligently across all of the platforms they support, Twist says.

Push Campaigns: With this tool, simply integrate Facebook’s SDK into your or and anyone on your team can configure automated campaigns to send – based on user behavior.

These in-app notifications are rich media cards that can be designed “in minutes” using Facebook Analytics for Appp’s visual design tool, Twist says.  

An example Twist notes: Say a visitor to your app adds an item to their cart but doesn’t check out. Within four hours, “why not send them a gentle nudge with a push notification? With push campaigns, you can.

To get started using Facebook Analytics for Apps, .

There are six questions that are used to analyze the strengths and weakness of an argument (Mayfield, 2007). Once we have the strengths and weaknesses it easy to depict whether an argument is good or bad. The editorial about ‘Sites caught sharing secret data with advertisers’ will be analyzed based on these questions which will prove how this editorial becomes a valid argument. The first question asks whether there are enough reasons in the editorial that support the conclusion drawn from it. When an editorial lacks reasoning for an argument it makes, it loses its credibility.

According to Bangeman (2010), websites such as Facebook and Myspace are sharing user’s personal information with advertisers without their consent. This argument is supported by the fact that the data sharing activity was noticed by researchers from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and AT&T Labs in August 2009. The Second question is concerned with any hidden assumptions that the editor may have made. The author of this news has not made any assumptions. The article provides links that prove any statement that the author has made.

For instance when (Bangeman, 2010) said “Users have also had a tough time navigating the site’s often-Byzantine privacy controls… ” said, he has also made ‘Byzantine privacy controls’ a link to an article that proves this argument. Third, does the article have any central words that show prejudice? (Mayfield, 2007). Slanted words reduce the credibility of the evidence and reasoning provided by the author. The editor has used words such ‘not surprisingly’ and ‘throughout history’ without any valid reasoning that shows a prejudice towards Facebook.

Fourth, one should analyze whether there are fallacies in the reasoning provided by the editor. Although the editor has provided links that give evidence to the statements, the article implies that advertisers such as Google are involved in the crime. The article does not give evidence of whether advertisers are intentionally looking for personal information that is being given to them illegally. Also the author states in the article that Facebook have stopped sharing information after the Wall Street Journal asked them.

There is no evidence to whether these websites have stopped sharing information. Next one should be looking for important information that is missing from the argument. In this editorial although important information that provides evidence to the conclusion is missing, there are links provided with almost every statement that the reader can look at and get the necessary information. Last but not the least the editorial must not have any false or incorrect information.

If an editorial has incorrect information then it misguides the reader and this problem can cause an argument to become invalid. The argument proposed in this editorial does not have any incorrect information because it is proven by researchers. Thus, the editorial is a valid argument because although it contains slant words and fallacies in reasoning, it is educating the reader correctly about a societal issue. The aim of this article is to provide the reader with adequate information so that they know what harm is being caused to them through social websites.

The editorial has fallacies in reasoning in only a few cases which are very minor to the explanation of the issue and so it is achieving its goal by informing the reader about the gist of the issue. References Bangeman, E. (2010, May 21). Sites caught sharing secret data with advertisers. CNN Internationa. Retrieved from: http://edition. cnn. com/2010/TECH/05/21/facebook. shares. data. ars/index. html Mayfield, M. (2007). Thinking for yourself: Developing critical thinking skills through reading and writing (7th ed. ). Boston: Thomson Wadsworth.