New research suggests that PR is the clear choice of marketing tool when it comes to social media, with ads delivering lower click-through rates on social sites than traditional online platforms.
Social advertising network Lotame carried out a comprehensive study into the click-through performance of more than 100 of its social media campaigns compared against figures provided by Google ad metrics company DoubleClick for non-social sites.
It found that ads running on social sites, such as Bebo and Flixster, returned lower click-through rates compared with those running on conventional sites.
However, the story was somewhat different when they analysed the relative effectiveness of interactive advertisements, with such ads achieving a higher average click-through rate of 68% on social sites compared with 62% for the DoubleClick sample.
Leading commentators across all marketing disciplines have been quick to put the results down the different culture within the social media landscape.
Users of social media look for engagement and involvement, making them far more the marketing domain of PR, which seeks to inform and promote interaction, than traditional online advertising models.
It is clear that there is still a market in social media for advertisers who deliver creative and engaging online campaigns, although the distinction between expensive interactive ads and the more cost-effective online PR alternative is blurring.
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