Research: Women pal with brands on social media
Brand allies. Women are interacting with brands on social networks by incorporating them into their friends lists and by following them on Twitter, according to the 2009 Social Media Study conducted by US female-insight community SheSpeaks.
Fifty percent of women with social network profiles have purchased products because of information they got from friends or companies on social media sites, the survey found. In addition, 80% of respondents have become fans of products or brands on Facebook.
The study also demonstrates that females look for more than 140 characters when it comes to brands online. “Women are more likely to have learned about new products, joined a brand/product group, commented about products, etc, on a social networking website than they have on Twitter,” SheSpeaks says.
However, women really don’t pay that much attention to ads on social networking sites. More than 20% say they actively ignore ads on their pages, while 10% report that while they notice ads, they have never clicked through.
But there’s good news for advertisers too. While just 13% of respondents to the 2008 survey said they sometimes looked at ads and thought they were interesting enough to click through, some 30% of those questioned late last year reported the same sentiment.
