VISUAL CULTURE AND SOCIAL MEDIA

Visual Culture and Social Media

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction2

Background of the study2

Purpose of the Study3

Research question3

Rationale3

SMS Advertising4

Chapter 2: Facebook7

Chapter 3: Twitter9

Chapter 3: Internet and 3G Phones12

Chapter 4: Conclusion14

References16

Chapter 1: Introduction

Background of the study

Mobile marketing, where mobile (wireless) media is used as a content delivery and direct response channel in integrated campaigns alongside traditional media such as TV, radio and print, or as a stand alone medium, is fast becoming an important advertising and direct marketing tool. Well-known global brands already exploiting mobile marketing concepts include McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, MTV, Volvo, Sony Pictures, Nike, Disney and Adidas. Broadly speaking, mobile advertising revenue totaled US$ 2,773 million in 2007, and has been forecast to almost double to US $5 billion in 2008. Previous studies have shown short message service (SMS) advertising to be effective both as a brand vehicle and in stimulating consumer response (Barthes 1972 121)

The uniqueness of SMS advertising lies in its potential to target consumers in a specific context ( Barnes, 2002; Muk, 2007). Therefore, prior research has mainly focused on permission-based (i.e. push-based) mobile advertising. Permission-based mobile advertising can be defined as a message ( SMS and MMS) that has been requested by the consumer as part of an opt-in scheme (e.g. a consumer fills in their mobile phone number on a regular customer registration form and agrees to receive commercial messages and information of interest). Permission-based advertising messages are powerful because by signing up to an opt-in list, the consumer is requesting the messages from the advertiser rather than simply being exposed to it. Therefore, as suggested by Martin et al. (2003), advertisers can gain better value for their money as the message recipients have already indicated a level of interest in the messages.

Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of this study is to discuss cultural and social impact of mobile phone advertising, and to understand the philosophy of SMS based mobile phone advertising on Facebook and other social networks.

Research question

Q1 should: What are the motives/advantages of SMS based mobile phone advertising on social networks?

How companies are using social networks sites for mobile phone advertising?

Rationale

Besides permission-based mobile advertising, marketers are increasingly engaging in call-to-action/direct-response (pull-based) mobile advertising. That is, a customer is encouraged to send an SMS message in response to a call-to-action, for instance, in a TV, radio, on-pack or press advert ( Trappey and Woodside, 2005). In Europe, one of the most widely used forms of direct-response mobile advertising is the Text “n” Win (also called Text 2 Win) promotion which is usually advertised on a package of something, like crisps, a candy bar or a drink, and the customer is invited to send a text message to a shortcode number for a chance to win a prize (Keegan, 2005). For instance, Pepsi recently worked with Enpocket to drive sales of Pepsi, and leverage Pepsi's Team England association in the run up to the World Cup finals by distributing approximately 95 million units of Pepsi Max, Pepsi Max Twist, Pepsi Regular ...