Inside Facebook
Inside Facebook |
- Appatyze Launches Facebook App Display Ad Network
- Color’s Implicit Social Graph and How Facebook Could Respond
- Traction for The Dark Knight Leads Warner Bros to Rent More Films Via Facebook
- Featured Facebook Campaigns: Levi’s and Water.org, Sprite and Discover Ireland
- Dating, Horoscopes, Quizzes, Photos, Music and More on This Week’s Top 20 Facebook Apps by MAU
| Appatyze Launches Facebook App Display Ad Network Posted: 28 Mar 2011 06:06 PM PDT
Though there is plenty of competition in the space, judging by the 70-plus other companies on Facebook’s approved ad network list, Appatyze’s simplicity might make it a good choice for independent developers who want to quickly begin monetizing their traffic.
The Appatyze ad bar accommodates five different ad formats, ranging in pixel size from 590 by 80 to 110 by 80. The service’s ad editor lets advertisers choose their size, border, and intro message. They can then place and manage bids, and follow their campaigns in Appatyze’s internal analytics.
As is typical, Appatyze charges developers a commission on the income they receive, and doesn’t charge advertisers or developers an agency fee. The company is backed by Ian Livingstone, founder of Eidos Interactive. Though its service offering is a stripped-down version of what other larger, more established ad networks such as the Rubicon Project offer, Appatyze can carve out a niche on Facebook. For developers wanting to optimize display monetization, Appatyze could be worth adding to the rotation to see how it compares to other networks. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Color’s Implicit Social Graph and How Facebook Could Respond Posted: 28 Mar 2011 03:10 PM PDT Last week, photo sharing app Color launched in the iOS and Android stores after announcing it had received $41 million in funding. The app’s most important feature is its ability to colocate users and determine their “implicit” social graph, or the people they spend time with. This data be could be extraordinarily valuable to marketers in similar ways to how Facebook’s explicit social graph and interest graph are. However, Facebook has already been collecting this data through Places check-ins and photo tags, and could potentially distribute its own colocation feature to its enormous native mobile app install base to develop a more accurate implicit social graph.
There’s been a great deal of discussion about the value to users of of Color’s first generation photo sharing app. However, with strong talent including Bill Nguyen, founder of music streaming service Lala that sold to Apple, and plenty of money in the bank, Color has the resources to improve or pivot the user-facing experience. What’s important is that Color find a way to acquire active users that can populate its implicit social graph, which maps who a user spends their time near instead of who they’ve explicitly listed as their friends. Currently, when users take a photo, they’re turning on 20 to 40 of their phone’s sensors, including the microphone, accelerometer, light sensor, antenna strength, and Bluetooth readings. While the accuracy of Color’s technology is yet to be proven, this data can be matched with that of other Color users to determine if they’re in proximity. According to the app’s end user license agreement terms of service, Color
This means Color can potentially use the data to target advertising, deals or other monetization services. In fact, Nguyen says Color is ”much more of a research company and a data mining company than a photo sharing site.” This data could be the revenue stream that validates its funding, and makes it a threat to Facebook’s ownership of the social graph.
Facebook has long been charging advertisers for access to aggregate forms of its graph of explicitly defined friend connections, user profile information, and the interest graph of connections to brands and other entities. It seems unlikely that Facebook would allow Color to stake a claim on this new data stream without getting into the game more directly. Facebook could try to develop its own colocation technology (Color says it has six pending patents). Rather than using this as an unfamiliar location-based photo sharing feature similar to Color, Facebook could use colocation to suggest nearby friends to tag in Places check-ins or photos. Facebook could roll out the feature to its 100 million monthly iPhone and Android native app users, according to AppData, and instantly begin collecting more data than Color. Colocation data could be combined with existing Places check-ins and photo tags, though biased by a user’s explicit social graph, to create the implicit social graph. Alternatively, though less probably, Facebook could acquire Color. Facebook has said it plans to acquire up to 20 companies this year. However, this one would be at a much higher price than Facebook’s typical acquisitions, and Nguyen has said he has no interest in selling. Still, paying an inflated price might be the easiest way for Facebook to ensure its continued supremacy. Either way, Facebook already has the advertiser relations to leverage the implicit social graph, and it could use the data internally to refine its news feed algorithm. Color is trying to tap into a data stream with enormous implications for the future of social networking and marketing. It might be the first technology with a chance to disrupt Facebook’s dominance, but don’t expect Facebook to sit back and let that happen. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traction for The Dark Knight Leads Warner Bros to Rent More Films Via Facebook Posted: 28 Mar 2011 11:54 AM PDT Warner Bros has expanded its test of renting films through Facebook, adding “Watch” tabs to Pages for five more films. Since its release on March 8th, 98,330 users have engaged with the “Watch The Dark Knight” app hosting the original test of the streaming service. The streaming app for the additional films, developed by Milyoni, has not been changed to bring Facebook’s social features any closer to the viewing experience. The five films to receive renting capabilities are "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone", "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets", "Inception", "Life as We Know It", and "Yogi Bear." The inclusion of both complicated, more adult films and family films may help Warner Bros determine if a specific audience type is more receptive to Facebook rentals.
The near 100,000 users of the Dark Knight app, according to Facebook’s Open Graph protocol, only represent 1.6% of The Dark Knight Page’s total fans, and we can’t tell how many actually paid the 30 Facebook Credits, or $3, to rent the film. Still, the traction was apparently sufficient to warrant further testing. The rate at which The Dark Knight’s Page has been adding fans has slightly increased from roughly 10,000 to 17,000 new fans a day during March, according to PageData, our fan growth tracking service. This indicates the streaming rentals may have somewhat increased virality. Note that the Page grew 1.8 million fans between March 14th and 18th, but that this is likely due to unofficial Dark Knight Pages being folded into the official Page.
Warner Bros could do much more to stimulate mentions of the rental service, though. Users can click Facebook and Twitter share buttons within the streaming app, but can’t compose their own updates from scratch, or leave any sort of public comments while viewing. The addition of Facebook’s Comments Box social plugin, the option to chat with other viewers, or a persistent status update field could help the Warner Bros film rental service gain more visibility in the news feed, drawing in new customers. The ability to gift a rental to a friend, or watch a film simultaneously with friends using different computers could also drive sales. Before the film studio concludes its test of the value of offering streaming rentals through the social network, it needs to make sure its app takes advantage of all of Facebook’s viral channels. Users aren’t watching in a silent theater or alone on their couch – they’re a click away from discussing the film with all their friends. Watching films on Facebook could be a whole new social experience, but Warner Bros or any other long-form content distributor will need design their apps to promote interaction with friends. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Featured Facebook Campaigns: Levi’s and Water.org, Sprite and Discover Ireland Posted: 28 Mar 2011 09:36 AM PDT Among notable campaigns on Facebook in the past week, a Levi's and Water.org partnership offered a branded app that taught users about saving water, Sprite's Spark Park Project asked users on Facebook to help decide what basketball courts need remodeling. Then there was Tourism Ireland, which created a virtual Ireland to hook users on the real island nation and give them a chance to win a trip there. We've excerpted the Levi’s campaign bleow. You can see the full week's coverage in the Facebook Marketing Bible, which also includes detailed breakdowns of dozens of other featured campaigns by top-performing brands and businesses on Facebook.
Levi's and Water.org's WaterTankGoal: Engagement, Network Exposure, Page Growth, Product Purchase Core Mechanic: A WaterTank game developed by Levi's to support Water.org efforts to save water and support the organization's clean water projects across the globe. Game: WaterTank is a game developed by Levi's to support Water.org that helps users learn about saving water. Method: By playing the Levi's WaterTank game, users can complete a series of tasks to unlock water for Levi's to donate $250,000 around the world as part of Water.org's mission. For example, Liking the Levi's Page unlocks 1,000 liters. Users can complete several such tasks, pledging to wash your jeans bi-weekly instead of weekly saves water, tweeting about the game, answering questions, donating, etc. Other challenges include: using the #waterless hashtag on Twitter, checking into a Levi's store in the U.S., inviting friends to play WaterTank, donating money to Water.org, scan a QR code in a Levi's store and watch a Levis-Water.org video. Each challenge completed also generates a Facebook feed story. The game and accompanying water donations runs from March 22 through May 8. Impact: The Levi's Page has more than 3.7 million Likes, possibly helped in part by the game's request of players to Like the Page to stay updated about the water initiative. Payers have unlocked more than 66 million liters of water by playing WaterTank and the game notes thousands of challenges have been completed with the game. By generating a feed story for each challenge completed, Levi's really leverages each and every user and every action they take on the game to spread the word about the game, which probably explains why, in just about a week, the company's 200 million liter goal is more than 25% complete. How are top brands in the industry designing their Facebook marketing campaigns? See the Facebook Marketing Bible for detailed breakdowns of dozens of Featured Campaigns by top-performing brands and businesses on Facebook. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Dating, Horoscopes, Quizzes, Photos, Music and More on This Week’s Top 20 Facebook Apps by MAU Posted: 28 Mar 2011 08:18 AM PDT
Top Gainers This Week
Badoo continued to grow tremendously by adding 6.2 million MAU this week alone; the app has seen great success with its Q&A format about a users' friends. Every time a user answers a question about a friend, the app generates a feed story. Another dating app mimicking Badoo's format is Cupid, which grew by 618,900 MAU by asking question about your friends and publishing the answer to the stream.
There were horoscope apps, too, both named Daily Horoscope. Second place Daily Horoscope grew by more than 1.8 million users by publishing horoscopes to a user's feed and by asking users to invite friends to use the app. Eighth place Daily Horoscope saw 668,200 MAU by publishing a daily Wall post horoscope. Two music apps on our list seem to be filling what's been a void on Facebook — music — now that MySpace's future is uncertain. BandPage by RootMusic grew by 1.4 million MAU this week; the app is essentially Facebook Connect and asks users to use their Facebook email addresses. Then there was Band Profile: Profile Pages for Musicians, which grew by 341,400 MAU; the app allows users to make the app a default landing tab. The app allows users to include a bio, band photo, post unlimited songs for streaming/downloading/sale, post shows, sell tickets and track how the music is spreading.
Video and photo apps were on the list, too. VidyoTV Video saw 833,700 MAU this week; the apps posts videos to the stream when used, as well as allowing users to Share videos. Videoloji grew by 595,000 MAU; the apps creates feed stories by posting daily videos, as well as allowing Share and Like opportunities. My Photos publishes a different photo of you from your Facebook photos daily and grew by 305,000 MAU. Spot the Difference is a timed puzzle asking users to identify a number of differences in two identical photos and grew by 302,800 MAU. Finally, there were some interesting quiz apps on the list. Quiz Taco grew by 395,900 MAU and follows the Badoo-esque Q&A format of asking users 25 questions of their friends, generating a feed story with each answer. Then there was the Chinese 大腦分析 (Analysis of Brain) which creates a photo album published to the stream and also gives users chances to publish feed stories. The Connect friend.ly app grew by 753,000 MAU this week, too. |
Today, UK-based 
Non-game applications were very popular on our list of top apps by monthly active users this week. Dating, horoscopes, music, video and photos, Connect and quiz apps made up the list, which contained apps growing between 6.2 million and 302,800 MAU this week. Our list is compiled using 
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