Awesome Flickr Gallery Error - Photoset not found
Social Media Week Beirut’s third day of talks and panel discussions was held today at AltCity, Hamra, and revolved around the themes of social media in advertising, social collaboration, journalism, and community engagement.
The full-day event kicked off with a panel discussion on “Social Media Evolution and Advertising”. Patrick Attalah, Managing Director of 90:10, led the discussion between panelists Walid Madi of Impact BBDO, Karine Jazra from Groupe i&e, Rasha Rteil of Mindshare, and Marc Dfouni from Eastline.
Attalah began the discussion by showing a comedy clip of a consumer breaking up with an advertiser because he “just didn’t get her.” This segued into the topic of personalized advertising, or using the information people put online on their Facebook, Twitter, Hulu, LinkedIn, and other accounts to modify what products are advertised on their pages. This relatively new strategy in advertising can reap huge profits for both advertisers and the companies that store or organize this information.
The panel agreed that personalized online advertising was the new way to engage the consumer, and that advertising campaigns were transforming as a result. As Madi put it: “I’m not going to recommend a product to my friend because I like the product. I’m going to recommend it to my friend because I like my friend.” New changes in social media have allowed this friend-to-friend product advertising to become much easier and more effective.
During the Q&A with the panel, an audience member brought up blogging, and asked whether the trend was fading. Dfouni disagreed, saying that the quality of blogging in Lebanon has never been better, and that the number of bloggers has increased, making blogging “an important channel” for advertisers to reach consumers. The state of Lebanon’s internet was also discussed, with the panel agreeing that despite the frustrating quality of internet service in the country, social media has flourished in Lebanon and could only improve with the advent of 3G internet.
AltCity was packed to standing room only. Audience members listened to the discussion while tapping away on laptops and phones, live tweeting the event. At one point, as Atallah attempted to calm down the talkative audience, he quipped, “Can you please stop talking and just start tweeting?” They listened, and the next speaker, William Kanaan of Google, was introduced.
Kanaan, Head of New Business Development for Google in the Middle East and North Africa, began his talk by discussing the widespread use of Google in the region; over 100 million searches a day, and about the same number of YouTube videos watched every day. Kanaan noted humorously that for some reason, the top Google search in Lebanon is…Lebanon (followed by ‘facebook,’ ‘lyrics,’ ‘beirut,’ and ‘google.’)
Kanaan then began his discussion of Google’s newest feature, Google+, which has had remarkable success in its fledgling months. Over 25 million users joined in the first month of the 91-day-old project, and the numbers continue to grow.
One of the most appealing features of Google+ is the user’s ability to create “circles” of friends, acquaintances, family members, or people he or she simply does not like, without their knowledge. A Google+ user can control what information they share with each circle in order to maintain their privacy.
Another popular feature Kanaan discussed was “hangouts,” the ability to video chat with up to nine friends at the same time and share documents, pictures, and games while chatting, or even live streaming the hangout for others to view.
Finally, Kanaan noted that Google+ is expanding its mobile device usage, so that people can upload and share content on-the-go. As of today, only Android phones can use Google+, but Kanaan announced their intention to adapt the project to iPhones as well.
Kanaan’s Q&A with the audience mostly revolved around Google+ in relation to Facebook. One questioner noted that Facebook has been “aggressively reacting” to Google+, and another asked how Google+ differentiated itself from the already well-established social network.
To answer the second question, Knaan turned to the audience. Peoples called out :
“Hangouts!”
“Games!”
“Privacy!” and;
“It’s not Facebook!”
An interesting place to leave off for the afternoon’s speakers, which included Samer Ragheb of Facebook.
Afternoon events: journalism, brand exposure, and ‘Word of Mouth’ marketing
The second half of Social Media Week Beirut’s day-long event began with a lively panel discussion on the role of ‘citizen journalists’—or bloggers and social media users—on journalism and media today.
The panel, entitled “Crowd-sourcing, social collaboration, citizen journalism and the future of traditional journalism,” was introduced by Nathalie Bontems, the Beirut Operations Manager of Communicate Magazine. Bontems noted that compared to U.S. media outlets, which tend to rank high on Alexa.com’s USA rankings, in Lebanon, media websites such as Al-Akhbar and Assafir rank in the 20′s. Bontems also mentioned how the prominent US citizen journalism website Huffington Post tends to rank high on Alexa.com.
Other panelists had different interpretations of the relationship between traditional journalism and the boom of social media. Sibylle Rizk, Editor-in-Chief of Commerce du Levant, emphasized the difficult economic climate facing traditional journalism. She pointed out that professional journalists are paid to do their jobs when others essentially do it for free, and questioned how citizen journalists can finance the necessary fact-checking and research.
Hibr.me’s Managing Editor Maya Rahal responded by arguing that the blogging and social media community is effectively self-monitoring. When a blogger posts something erroneous, the community—fellow bloggers—will say so and the blogger’s credibility will take a hit with his audience and peers.
At the heart of the discussion was the issue of how to combine traditional reporting with social media while still preserving journalistic accuracy and integrity, and the panel provided some intriguing views on the future of journalism.
The panel was followed by a presentation by Samer Ragheb of Facebook, who discussed the power of word of mouth on Facebook in marketing and brand exposure. Through a combination of statistics and short videos, Ragheb demonstrated the way Facebook users reach out to an astounding number of people in different networks. He stated that for every friend someone has on Facebook, they can reach about 113 of that user’s friends through a post, a comment, or ‘liking’ something.
To Ragheb, “Facebook gives the ability to control, predict, and measure word of mouth.”
He then presented a case study of the beer Lebanese Brew to illustrate his point. The new brewery, starting with a small budget and essentially no name recognition, created brand awareness through videos and ‘apps’ on Facebook that allowed users to deliver Lebanese Brew to their homes or demand that local stores begin to stock the beer. According to Ragheb, the brewery doubled their product sales through the Facebook campaign.
When Q&A opened up, one audience member brought up the common complaint of Facebook’s constantly changing format. “Facebook just keeps changing…it’s like women, you can never really understand it,” he said.
Amidst audience laughter, Ragheb responded that “every time we finish [a new feature or design], we always have something new to do. We will never stop changing; embrace that.”
The Nokia speakers took the stage as graffiti artists started a project covering the back wall of AltCity: a large mural of various faces framing the words “Connecting People.” Nokia’s tri-part presentation, entitled “When Nokia Engages with the Audience,” discussed Nokia’s mission in connecting people worldwide.
Their first speaker, Tania Retief, talked about the ‘social media revolution’ of the web. Whereas the initial web model was driven by companies like Amazon, Ebay, and Google, ‘Web 2.0′ is driven by Facebook, Twitter, and other participatory websites that promote social networks.
Retief stressed the importance of ‘ATA’ in social media: authenticity, transparency, and altruism in posting content.
“You have to figure out what it is that you want to say. You’ve only got one chance, working as yourself, to be credible in social media,” Retief said. “Social media is very unforgiving.”
Nokia’s next two speakers, James Whatley and Antoine Naaman, discussed the company’s advocacy program in the region, and its ideas for outreach through word of mouth. The Nokia presentation wrapped up with questions about their products and marketing strategy through social networking.
The final presentation of the day was a panel discussion on “Social Business and PR 2.0.” Led by Karine Jazra, the panelists included professional social media consultant Ayman Itani, Mounir Camel Toueg of Leo Burnett, Assad Thebian from Takreem, and Lucas Lamah of beiruting.com.
published in Hibr.me by Sarah Owermohle
