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Wednesday 25 June 2014

On 01:37 by Vishal Sawlani in    1 comment
Hey Buddy, it’s too long we haven’t met, let’s catch up some day”, “hey, where are you, I have been calling you, you are not responding”, “hey dude, where the hell have you been?”, “these days you are so busy, I miss you bro”. This is how we used to express our emotions, right from the bottom of our heart to all our dear buddies, before the social media era. Today also we have been saying all these but the same has been replaced by one single click on “LIKE BUTTON” which is a feature of social networking service Facebook, where users can like content such as status updates, comments, photos, links shared by friends, and advertisements.

Now we have entered into the world where from expression to conversation, everything is virtual and the world has accepted this very fast and positively. Only five years ago, the term “like” was just another word used to describe one’s preferences. In last 5 years, the whole human expression traits have changed vividly. In today’s digital universe, however, the notion of “liking” something has become ubiquitous.
 
Liking is one of the primary ways people exert their tastes and preferences online, and it has created an entirely new type of conversation – one between consumers and brands. However, Generation-X people are finding it tough to adjust with this as they see and believe that such form of expression leads to making them feel “UNREAL”. Generation-Y and Generation-Z have accepted it without any choice as in such highly paced life where simply being in touch with your buddies becomes a challenge (earlier it was fun), one single click on “LIKE BUTTON” has become a lifetime solution for expression.
Gradually, the idea of “Liking” has gone a unwise shift in both meaning and intent as a result of Facebook “LIKE BUTTON”. This clearly indicates that expression “LIKE” has moved away from the realm of the emotive internal life of an individual into the realm of discursive public sphere of societies. This process of clicking on “LIKE BUTTON” on Facebook has become an action rather to feel about it. Today, social media has become a trading platform for expressions. Most people tend to live in exchange of “LIKES”. “If you like me only then I like you”. “If I like you but you don’t like me then I too will not like you”. Even on these days, people like their own status, photo, comment etc. on Facebook!! Strange Virtual World isn’t it?
 
To understand the true sense behind “what will be FACEBOOK without this one social plugin feature called “LIKE BUTTON”, WILL IT DIE SOON?” let me throw some light on “DIGITAL LIKING" by giving you some shocking and amazing stats”.
 
1) On an average day, Facebook pages get over 50mn LIKES. That’s 578 likes a second
2) One in 5 websites is using Facebook “LIKE BUTTUN”. That’s over 125mn websites around the world.
3) On an average, people who like websites on Facebook have 2.5 times more friends.
4) Clicking on “LIKE BUTTON” is the most preferred activity people do on Facebook.
5) As of today, since the inception of “LIKE BUTTON”, the total number of Facebook likes reached at 37bn.
6) 52% of Fans like a page to get a coupon or discount.
7) 55% of Facebook Fans like a page so they can participate in contests.

The Facebook has started taking an advantage of this inexorable habit of human expression on virtual platform. It has officially declared that it will be tracking our online consumption and behavior both on and off Facebook. Like Google, Facebook wants to leverage its understanding of our user behavior to serve you more targeted ads.
 
Facebook has been using our likes and posts on Facebook to target ads to us already. Now, Facebook will track us across any website you visit, as long as the site has a “Like button”, a Facebook login, or any Facebook code. Not only this, Facebook will track us reading habits even if we don't login via Facebook or click on “Like button” on the site.

For advertisers, Facebook is aiming to build a bank of data to help target advertising better. This can be a big business for Facebook. Google has earned as much as $13billions from data-based targeting. Facebook is looking to take a larger piece of this growing market.


Recently I Saw an Interesting Billboard ad (featuring model) of Myntra – ecommerce giant of fashion apparel that says “I got 255 likes for my Sun and Sand Look”. I am amazed to see the way companies have identified and started exploiting this one of the most popular activities of clicking “LIKE BUTTON” on social media world.

By now I believe you could imagine how this one feature called “LIKE BUTTON” has become a major source of revenue for Facebook and lot other advertisers. Now if this social plug in feature is removed from Facebook then I believe most of us probably may be very uncomfortable while using Facebook as it may create big vacuum in our mind and gradually, Facebook will be faded as nobody will find a reason to stay on this largest virtual nation.

I am very amazed to see the way today most of the companies use our act of clicking on “LIKE BUTTON” as an ingredient to generate revenue and profit. Just 5 years before, saying ‘I LIKE YOU’ was nothing but merely an emotion coming from our heart.

 

1 comment:

  1. I've never used the like button but it does seem like a pretty big deal, doesn't it?

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