The Cost of Social Media

We use a number of social media platforms in our every day lives. Facebook for socializing, Twitter for news, Instagram for pictures (and now videos),Tumblr for whatever it is Tumblr is for.  And that’s just scratching the surface.  In my opinion, these platforms have blown up because they’re easy to use and most importantly they are free.  But how do they stay free?  And what does it cost users for these platforms to remain free?

Here's an example of an ad on Instagram.

Unfortunately, each of these social media platforms needs to make money in order to remain free to users, which leads us to advertising on social media.  Let’s be honest here, advertising on social media platforms is annoying, albeit a necessary evil.  Recently there has been tremendous growth in social media advertising.  Along with the announcement of its IPO, Twitter announced a new ad platform.  Then, Instagram announced advertisements.  Even Pinterest is getting in on the action.

A promotoed tweet on Twitter.

So what does this mean for the user?  Well for starters our experiences on these platforms is seriously about to change. I’ve already noticed a change on Twitter, although it’s inconsistent about when I have ads and then when I do have ads, they are usually not targeted to me.  Same goes for Facebook ads, which are consistently on my newsfeed but generally irrelevant to my life.

I don't have a dog....

I will happily have ads on all of my social media networks if it means I keep getting free access.  However, I firmly believe advertisers are under using this advertising opportunity.  Twitter has a vast amount of data about each of its users, based on profiles, who they follow and what they tweet about. It should be easy to target content towards certain people.  This is not the case.  I have never once seen an ad targeted towards me, which I personally find ridiculous because I have a public Twitter profile with an obvious bio.  On Facebook, I can be equally as easily targeted through pages I like, as well as based off of my bio. 

Why does it seem like an opportunity is being wasted?  In my opinion it is.  Social media is an amazing place for advertisers to target their core audiences.  I’m more likely to follow through on an ad that aligns with my interest, as opposed to an ad that has nothing to do with me and instead turns me off to that brand.  While interaction on social media between brand and consumer is extremely important, I also think that understanding advertising on social media is just as important.  Taking advantage of data provided by Twitter and Facebook about their users is already an invaluable too and will only continue to grow as social media becomes even more widely relied upon.

Check out my Vine about ads on social media: https://vine.co/v/hw7urAgBb5I