AMITY SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATION AMITY UNIVERSITY Noida, Uttar Pradesh Advertising Term Paper On

Advertising impact on World Wide Web with special emphasis on Social networking sites

Submitted by: Submitted to: Aayush Mehta Tanu Bhargava Enrollment No: A202871008 Lecturer Batch: 2010-13 Amity School of Communication

Amity University Amity School of Communication

This is to certify that the project entitled Advertising impact on World Wide Web with special emphasis on Social networking sites being submitted by Aayush Mehta for the award of the Degree of Bachelors of journalism and Mass communication is a record of bonafide research work carried out by him. Aayush has worked under my guidance and supervision and fulfilled the requirements for the submission of this project which to my knowledge has reached the requisite standard.

Name of the Guide Tanu Bhargava

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I feel extremely grateful to Ms. Tanu Bhargava, Amity School of Communication, Amity University, Noida. She opened my eyes of ignorance with the touch of her knowledge and experience on advertising. She acted as a friend, philosopher and guide. I will always remain indebted to her for her encouragement and guidance, and look forward for her guidance in future also. I acknowledge my gratitude to Amity School of Communication, Noida for following me to undertake this research project. This work is an outcome of a dream of my parents. They inspired, encouraged and gave emotional strength to me to fulfil their long cherished dreams. My thanks to the respondents of the questionnaires. They filled up the questionnaire inspite of their busy schedule. Last, but not the least I want to thank all the known and unknown forces, who have made this task an easy one. -Aayush Mehta

INDEX

Introduction Topic Relevance of the topic Literature Review Objective Concepts and key terms Hypothesis Methodology - Research methods, research design, method of data collection Findings, Discussion & Conclusion Bibliography Appendix

Introduction: The social networking sites are gaining a lot of popularity these days with almost all of the educated youth using one or the other such site. These have played a crucial role in bridging boundaries and crossing the seas and enabling them to communicate on a common platform. It has become a popular and a potential mean for them to stay friends with the existing ones and to grow up their social circle at least in terms of acquaintances. Social Media (SM) has been the subject of extensive discussion in publications and forums in recent years. This has been due to its popularity and rapid growth. Its power to spread information and engage consumers has been recognized and studied by many researchers in different disciplines, and in the business environment most of the publications have only described the features of these tools. SM can be briefly defined as web application tools that allow users to publish and broadcast content in order to open and invite participation in conversations. From the amount of commentary on SM it seems to be a very dynamic ecosystem (Safko & Break, 2009) where marketing and advertising people have found a new opportunity: it provides an active conversation between the brand/business and its customers. The most attractive element of this channel is the potential for interactivity Social Network Sites. (SNS) allow users to create a profile that includes information, such as: date of birth, relationship status, hobbies, preferences, interests, etc. These sites were originally thought as a good way to find old classmates (Page, 2010, p. 425). However, nowadays these types of sites allow conversations between users through a very characteristic layout. A common misinterpretation is that social media and social network sites are the same. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, each refers to different things: social network sites are a subcategory of social media (Safko & Break 2009, p.26). Online marketing expert McKeown (Enterprise Ireland Seminar, 22nd Oct 2009) gives a simple metaphor for it: Social Media is like a bag of tools and social networking is only a hammer.

Topic Social network advertising is used to describe a form of online advertising that focuses on social networking sites. One of the major benefits of advertising on a social networking site (Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, bebo, orkut...and many others) is that advertisers can take advantage of the users demographic information and target their ads appropriately. There have been many claims that Social Network Advertising will revolutionize the online advertising market. Most famously, founder of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg, announced that "For the last hundred years media has been pushed out to people, but now marketers are going to be a part of the conversation." No doubt social network advertising is a significant new way of reaching customers, but the market is far from being mature. There are three major classifications of Social Network Advertising:

Direct advertising that is based on your network of friends - This can be the most effective format but also causes the most controversy. An example is the Facebook beacon project. Based on an action your friend has taken, you might see a message in your news feed saying 'Bob has just bought a 'Radiohead CD from MusicWorld'. This can be an extremely effective mode as often people make decisions to purchase something or do something based on their close group of friends. However, there is also a lot of controversy surrounding this as it can be considered exploiting the personal relationships you have with your friends and also raises privacy concerns. Direct Advertising placed on your social networking site - This is a more traditional form of web advertising that is minimally effective. Just like you see banner ads on many other sites, this is a similar concept, except on a social networking site. You can see these - for example as a brick in the top right of MySpace pages, or as a banner on the left of Facebook profiles and so on. There are two differences however - One is that these social networks can take advantage of demographic data on your profile and hence target the ad directly to you. Secondly, these types of ads can also be placed by individual developers on their application pages through ad networks such as Sponsor Pay, AdParlor or Offerpal. They have access to the same data and can generate income for application developers giving them further motivation to create apps and giving advertisers a more engaging way to reach out to these social networking users.

Indirect Advertising by creating 'groups' or 'pages' - This is an innovative marketing technique in which a company will create a 'page' or 'group' that users can choose to join.

They will use this to build up 'subscribers' or 'fans' and use this to market a contest, a new product, or simply just to increase brand awareness. These groups can quickly grow in numbers of subscribers which can become a very effective marketing tool.

Relevance of the study In the world today there are many Social Networking Sites in existence on the World Wide Web (WWW). LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are the famous of social networking sites that most of the businesses use. These sites allow users to create profiles and add people as friends. It brings people with similar interests together (Weber, 2009) and also allows them to create connections to construct a social network. A social network consists of all the people friends, family and others with whom one shares a social relationship(Golder, Wilkinson, and Huberman, 2007). On a greater scale, social networks show how large groups of people are connected to each another (Golder, Wilkinson, and Huberman, 2007). According to the research by The Nielsen Company reported that in 2009, global consumers spent more than five and half hours on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter (Nielsen, 2010). About 82% increase in 2008 (Nielsen, 2010). With this increase of consumer use of social Network Sites, business has seen this as an opportunity to use those Social Networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube for their needs. Some of these opportunities include sales, marketing, recruitment, research, and technical support (Wilson, 2009). This paper will discuss at how social networking sites are used by business to communicate with customers and take advantage of companies using social networking sites to increase sales, well communicate with customers and efficient manage the feedbacks or complaint.

The definition of Social Network is a relationship between individuals within a group and it contain general expressions of mutual solidarity (Clemons, Barnett, and Appadurai, 2009). Social networks are recognized and maintained by agreement on objectives, social values, or even by choice of entertainment. So that, people trust one another in Social Network (Clemons, Barnett, and Appadurai, 2009). According to Boyd and Ellison, online social networks allows users to create public or semi-public profiles within the system, display other service users with whom they are connected and navigate their users and the users of others within the service (Boyd, and Ellison, (2007). Online social networks are different from traditional social networks in the vast quantities of data the former offers, via blogs, newsgroups, and email systems (Ma et al., 2008).

Last year in Australia, communicating in social networks sites were counted about 9 million people, among the figure, 75% of Australians have visited to Facebook and 59% of them created an account and spent more than 8 hours a month on the site. In addition, about 86% of people look to fellow users to organize online purchasing. It shows a great opportunity for business to transfer their brand and information to their target audience through Social Networking Sites (Stafford, 2010). The goal for most businesses is to create relationships through online social networks, marketing within an environment where they can learn about their target audience and share their message to only those people who would appreciate it, whilst fostering a credible reputation. Historically business has always depended upon offline social networks to spread their message but the corporate relationship was kept an arms length away. However through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc., there is less distance between the business world and the social world. This is evident in the way that people are currently using Twitter, although many users are simply broadcasting certain information, others are chatting and there are users that are simply using it as means of communication between friends. Whilst many users use Twitter for all these reasons and more there are users that follow other peoples tweets to keep informed about consumer products of interest (Clemons, Barnett, and Appadurai, 2009).

The vice president of media and agency insights in Nielsens online division, Jon Gibs mentioned that While video and text content remain central to the Web experience the desire of online consumers to connect, communicate and share is increasingly driving the mediums growth. (Nielsen, 2009). Form August 2008 to August 2009, online advertising in social networking sites increased 119% and spending form $49 million to $108 million (Nielsen, 2009). According to the International Data Group estimate the social network advertising is projected to reach $1.4 billion in 2011 (Yorke, 2010).Those statistics and research are persuasively illustrated that social networks can influence peoples lives and buying demand. People spend a lot of time on those sites, their reach and their platform for interaction between other buyers or consumers shows the need for business to continue to use social networks to communicate with their target audience. Recently, a report recorded on the Fortune 100 Global Companies showed that those companies 65% on Twitter, 54% on Facebook, 50% on YouTube and 33% using Blogs.(Burson-Marsteller, 2010). 79% of the Top 100 Global companies are using at least one of the most popular sites to interact with their consumers (Burson-Marsteller, 2010).

Why too many global companies are using Social Network Advertising? Advertising on Social Networking Sites can be low cost or zero cost. In the current global economic climate, business and organizations are focusing on the cost reduction. So this type of advertising is a highly feasible strategy in this economic situation. To compare with the traditional

advertising, the Social Network Adverting seems to require time to establish the effective profile and posts, and more time to actually implement these techniques on a regular basis, but it have low costs for the business (Sommers, 2010). One of the samples, A local restaurant created a page on Facebook to promote their business, this page got more than thousand followers within three weeks, and the restaurant was able to release special offers, menu specials and competitions to their follows anytime and with zero cost (Sommers, 2010).

Facebook and Twitter provide quick updates information and company changes functions to users and however for more engaging conversation blogs are generally used to provide more information to their audience and allow for comments and questions. The report demonstrates that these social sites are not just for the company to broadcast information out to consumers, but for consumers to participate in open conversations with these companies by posting, commenting and following their Facebook pages, Twitter accounts or blogs (BursonMarsteller, 2010). Jetstar Company is one of an example of using social networks to promote their company. Jetstar has distributed at least 40% of its marketing budget into Social Networking Sites (mUmBRELLA, 2010). The advantage of social Network leads them away from expensive print media, such as magazine, which according to them were not actually bring good outcome indeed (mUmBRELLA, 2010). As a result, consumer response that great results for the company and led to increased sales from trials completed in 2009. Other few more examples represent they are widely and commonly using Social Network Sites to communicate with customer. Telstra uses blog widely for customer service; Harvey Norman uses Twitter to release the sales news; common banks in Australia including Commonwealth Bank create a Twitter account for customer service and etc (Commonwealth Bank, 2010). Commonwealth bank generates a newest online banking web page makes combination of social networking sites including Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Facebook promotes which the company is by publishing news update, allowing people to participate in surveys and contribute to saving tips (Commonwealth bank, 2010). Twitter is used for customer service needs by answering customer questions, tweeting the latest news and sharing links of interest such as rate increases (Commonwealth bank, 2011). Commonwealth bank uses YouTube to communicate with it customers by uploading videos to explain what Commonwealth bank is, how its accounts work, and videos clips or advertisement to interact with customers (Commonwealth bank, 2006). It is beneficial for businesses to use online social sites commonly. For instants, it could allow them to track customers, understand the customers thoughts and feelings better within, handle complaints efficiently and overall improve engagement as well as sales for their company (Segran, 2009).

As example mentioned above, the Social Network advertising are taking advantages of reduced cost, increased sales and the customer interaction. The following example of the American company Blendtec shows that using the Social Media Sites to promote the product and increase the sales. Blendtec released the blender goods by using the YouTube videos

Will It Blend series to promote the product. In the videos, companys CEO experimented to blend different items to demonstrate the capabilities of the product (Mashable, 2009). Through Blendtec this low cost marketing strategy increased 5 times of the sales of the blender product, effectively to aid sell and also the videos entertain many people around the world (Mashable, 2009). They establish a website special for the Will It Blend videos which let people to interact further with the brand by allowing them to view all of the videos from YouTube as well as give them proper ideas of what they can really use the blender for. The site also link to Facebook and Twitter and people can use the site or Facebook to suggest for the items which will be blended in the next videos (Blendtec, 2007).

On the other hand, receive feedback on your brand or product from your audience is a great step to get close with the customers. Starbucks have created a website called My Starbucks ideas ((Balwani, 2009). The reasons of creating this site is a platform that enables audience to share about their opinions or comments to Starbucks and customers can discuss the opinions and therefore Starbucks can be implemented to the public (My Starbucks Idea, 2010). This site presents all of the opinions that shared by the customers and bring out the voice of Ideas in Action to indicate the suggestions have been implemented into the stores (My Starbucks Idea, 2010). This also aid Starbucks on purchasing of coffee and helping grow the business with exactly what the customers want. Certainly there would have disadvantages by using the Social Network. It may be damaged the reputation of the brand, and this is why it is important that businesses build online platform to prevent the negative effect and guarantee and maintain their Social Network (Burson-Marsteller, 2010). Although there are existed some potential disadvantages that people shared negative comments with business, it is not represented to affect companies. Another way to say it is advantage for companies to provide opportunities to improve their weakness and attract customers participation.

Complaint or negative feedbacks can also arise from unsatisfied customers and quickly spread virally across the social sites. Companies would concern about this, and allows companies to participate with their customers and listen to their positions in the Social Network. In case of the companies without the social media sites, those customers would complain that they were not getting responses from the company, therefore company needs to set up this communication and get the root of a problem is the most crucial benefit company using social media (Burson-Marsteller, 2010).

Social media is a great advantage to companies as it allows them to engage with people at the level that they are on, even it is through Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or blogs. This engagement with their customers helps businesses to increase sales, allows the customer to be part of the brand or simply as a customer service tool. We have also seen the importance of

maintaining a social media plan to ensure customers are kept in active. While social networks open the company up to negative feedback and comments, it is much better for them to be in the space so they have a chance to reply back and be heard.

As more people are spending more time online as well as social networking sites, it represented that there are advantages for businesses to be participating in this Social Network. According to the data, 79% of businesses are already using some form of social networking for their business allowing them to essentially promote their brand or product to increase sales. As with the Blendtec example, a low cost effective YouTube campaign increased their sales five times (Mashable, 2009). The Starbucks My Starbucks Idea example, it showed that companies advantage from introducing the customer into their business and building their engagement to make them feel like they are part of the businesses and providing opinions for improvement. This engagement works two ways with the consumer feeling loyalty to the brand as they are part of the company itself. When the business considering to create Social Networking marketing or advertising, they need to organize and consider all aspects of Social Networking. If they have sufficient prepare of this plan or organization, it is possible to control any circumstances when it comes up. With regard to the negative feedbacks or complaint, companies can make improvements or respond immediately and become a part of customer service to solve and help customers in the fastest way. Overall, probably the strongest advantage of social networking in business is to the consumer. Allowing a customer to have the opportunity to receive customer service or have realized their concerns in short time to meets their needs for instant satisfaction. (Charlton, 2009)

In conclusion, business advertising in the Social Network Sites is a beneficial strategy to help profits increases. The characteristic of the online advertising is low cost, cost reduction almost exist in any business so that it is a great reason that business use it. In addition, Customer placed in the centre in the purpose of social networking in business. Therefore, allowing customers to have a pleased experience to solve their in real time which means satisfies their desire for instant satisfaction and instant results (Charlton, 2009). During the experience of social networking, customer not just able to access exclusive member offer, and at the same time they are also involved as one of the member who construct the brand. With this experience from consumers, businesses can continue to thrive and advantage from using social networks, therefore increasing their customer base as well as profits and well interaction with customers. Hence we can see the example above that demonstrated social network marketing is a tool employed throughout the world, and for good reason, including the popularity of social networking sites, the ripple effect of marketing on these sites, their ability to bring an organization to life and to gain the target audience, their economic value in increasing site traffic, and their ability to attract more and more potential consumers.

Social media-

New media is a broad term in media studies that emerged in the later part of the 20th century. For example, new media holds out a possibility of on-demand access to content anytime, anywhere, on any digital device, as well as interactive user feedback, creative participation and community formation around the media content. Another important promise of New Media is the "democratization" of the creation, publishing, distribution and consumption of media content. What distinguishes new media from traditional media is the digitizing of content into bits. There is also a dynamic aspect of content production which can be done in real time, but these offerings lack standards and have yet to gain traction. Wikipedia, an online encyclopaedia, is one of the best examples of the new media phenomenon, combining Internet accessible digital text, images and video with web-links, creative participation of contributors, interactive feedback of users and formation of a participant community of editors and donors. Most technologies described as "new media" are digital, often having characteristics of being manipulated, networkable, dense, compressible, and interactive.[1] Some examples may be the Internet, websites, computer multimedia, computer games, CD-ROMS, and DVDs. New media do not include television programs, feature films, magazines, books, or paper-based publications - unless they contain technologies that enable digital interactivity.[2

Literature Review:http://news-business.vlex.com/vid/using-social-advertising-improvemarketing-231017882

The potential usage of social media in the near future or even today is tremendous (Savage, 2010). As Savage (2010) indicated, the enormous volume of data provided by social media will provide both new challenges and new opportunities. Social media is already effective, but Savage predicted that once different types of social media recognize what is needed, the actual search engine time could be reduced from hours to minutes. Susan Dumais, a researcher for Microsoft, pointed out that the large amount of volume on the Web is very beneficial for some types of algorithms (Savage, 2010). Being knowledgeable of the value derived from social commerce networks is very important, especially since both social shopping communities and social commerce are increasing in size (Stephen and Toubia, 2010). Stephen and Toubia (2010) found that the sellers who benefit most from a network are those who gain the most accessibility by using the network. Understanding work-of-mouth marketing in online communities is also important (Kozinets et al, (2010). Kozinets and others (2010) explained that word-of-mouth marketing, which is influenced by consumer-to-consumer spending, has encompassed social media and viral marketing techniques.

Social media is also very important in the marketing area (Luke, 2009). The article by Luke (2009) found that 60 percent of planners averaging at least 16 online leads per year use social media. Luke's 2009 article pointed out that Facebook is the perfect forum for financial planners with large social networks or clients who are the type to use Facebook. LinkedIn, which was designed solely for business professionals, also provides an opportunity for parties to connect with centres of influence (Luke, 2009).

Social media is also having an effect on college students. Students can now go to GradeGuru.com and obtain papers, study guides and class notes (Cohern 2010). The article points out that Cliff notes and other printed material are still available and will never go out of fashion, but the GradeGuru.com site will give students an additional option. Social media and Business: Businesses have also realized that consumers use social media because it is fun. They can easily share their ideas, photos, videos, likes and dislikes with each other. Businesses realize that importance of having increased interaction with consumers and retailers, and the use of social media gives them the opportunity to more efficiently meet the demand of their customers.

An article by Liana Evans (2009) stated that by 2010, 60% of the Fortune 1000 Companies would be involved in some form of social media advertising. According to Evans article, half of the companies will fail. Evans (2009) questions what will happen to small businesses, if only 50% of the Fortune 1000 companies are successful. She does state, however, that small firms have some competitive advantages because of less red tape to deal with which to deal. Evans (2009) said that firms should follow the sequence below when developing an effective media marketing campaign. 1. Identify your audience 2. Define your success measurements 3. Plan a Strategy that Includes All Stakeholders 4. Be transparent 5. Recognize that it's not about you Knowing the target audience for the product to be promoted is very important and should probably be the first step in designing an effective marketing campaign. For example, if a promotion is designed for a rural area where high speed internet is not available yet, a satellite internet company might find TV or other mediums of communication more beneficial for promotion of its product that social networks. In conclusion it can be said that the companies devise their marketing strategies and product launch is based on the positive and negative feedback of the consumers on the SNS. The companies spend a large chunk of its budget on SNS advertising as it is cheaper and it covers a large target audience.

Objective of study

The objective that we wanted to achieve through our research is to: How internet ads on social networking affect target audience and how it helps in increase in sale of product/service. consumers can be affected by ads without consciously reading or listening to an ad they've been exposed to reported attitudes and knowledge are distinct from actual behaviours advertising can have both immediate and cumulative effects, calling into question whether any particular ad resulted in the ultimate purchase Hypothesis: sites The ads on the social networking sites affect the target audience. The ads increase in sale of product/ service. The usage of social networking sites The purchase experience of the consumers who were affected by the social network

Limitations of the study: 1. 2. The target audience is limited as rural target audience cannot be studied. Growth of SNS is underdeveloped.

Methodology: Secondary data: literature reviews, case studies might , published texts and statistic , media promotion and personal contacts would be utilized for the study. Data collection method: After secondary data collection over the internet, a primary research will be carried out through a questionnaire. The questionnaire will be well structured and the responses will be sought from the respondents. Qualitative research is a method of inquiry employed in many different academic disciplines, traditionally in the social sciences, but also in market research and further contexts. Qualitative researchers aim to gather an in-depth understanding of human behaviour and the reasons that govern such behaviour. The qualitative method investigates the why and how of decision making, not just what, where, when. Hence, smaller but focused samples are more often needed, rather than large samples. Qualitative researchers may use different approaches in collecting data, such as the grounded theory practice, narratology, storytelling, classical ethnography, or shadowing. Qualitative methods are also loosely present in other methodological approaches, such as action research or actor-network theory. Forms of the data collected can include interviews and group discussions, observation and reflection field notes, various texts, pictures, and other materials. Qualitative research often categorizes data into patterns as the primary basis for organizing and reporting results. Qualitative researchers typically rely on the following methods for gathering information: Participant Observation, Non-participant Observation, Field Notes, Reflexive Journals, Structured Interview, Semi-structured Interview, Unstructured Interview, and Analysis of documents and materials. The ways of participating and observing can vary widely from setting to setting. Participant observation is a strategy of reflexive learning, not a single method of observing In participant observation researchers typically become members of a culture, group, or setting, and adopt roles to conform to that setting. In doing so, the aim is for the researcher to gain a closer insight into the culture's practices, motivations and emotions. It is argued that the researchers' ability to understand the experiences of the culture may be inhibited if they observe without participating Some distinctive qualitative methods are the use of focus groups and key informant interviews. The focus group technique involves a moderator facilitating a small group discussion between selected individuals on a particular topic. This is a particularly popular method in market research and testing new initiatives with users/workers. One traditional and specialized form of qualitative research is called cognitive testing or pilot testing which is used in the development of quantitative survey items. Survey items are piloted on study participants to test the reliability and validity of the items

Interpretive techniques The most common analysis of qualitative data is observer impression. That is, expert or bystander observers examine the data, interpret it via forming an impression and report their impression in a structured and sometimes quantitative form. Coding is an interpretive technique that both organizes the data and provides a means to introduce the interpretations of it into certain quantitative methods. Most coding requires the analyst to read the data and demarcate segments within it. Each segment is labelled with a code usually a word or short phrase that suggests how the associated data segments inform the research objectives. When coding is complete, the analyst prepares reports via a mix of: summarizing the prevalence of codes, discussing similarities and differences in related codes across distinct original sources/contexts, or comparing the relationship between one or more codes. Some qualitative data that is highly structured (e.g., open-end responses from surveys or tightly defined interview questions) is typically coded without additional segmenting of the content. In these cases, codes are often applied as a layer on top of the data. Quantitative analysis of these codes is typically the capstone analytical step for this type of qualitative data. Contemporary qualitative data analyses are sometimes supported by computer programs, termed Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software. These programs do not supplant the interpretive nature of coding but rather are aimed at enhancing the analysts efficiency at data storage/retrieval and at applying the codes to the data. Many programs offer efficiencies in editing and revising coding, which allow for work sharing, peer review, and recursive examination of data. Mechanical techniques Some techniques rely on leveraging computers to scan and sort large sets of qualitative data. At their most basic level, mechanical techniques rely on counting words, phrases, or coincidences of tokens within the data. Often referred to as content analysis, the output from these techniques is amenable to many advanced statistical analyses. Mechanical techniques are particularly well-suited for a few scenarios. One such scenario is for datasets that are simply too large for a human to effectively analyze, or where analysis of them would be cost prohibitive relative to the value of information they contain. Another scenario is when the chief value of a dataset is the extent to which it contains red flags (e.g., searching for reports of certain adverse events within a lengthy journal dataset from patients in a clinical trial) or green flags (e.g., searching for mentions of your brand in positive reviews of marketplace products). Qualitative researchers may use different approaches in collecting data, such as the grounded theory practice, narratology, storytelling, classical ethnography, or shadowing. Qualitative methods are also loosely present in other methodological approaches, such as action research or actor-network theory. Forms of the data collected can include interviews and group discussions, observation and reflection field notes, various texts, pictures, and other materials.

Qualitative research often categorizes data into patterns as the primary basis for organizing and reporting results .Qualitative researchers typically rely on the following methods for gathering information: Participant Observation, Non-participant Observation, Field Notes, Reflexive Journals, Structured Interview, Semi-structured Interview, Unstructured Interview, and Analysis of documents and materials. The ways of participating and observing can vary widely from setting to setting. Participant observation is a strategy of reflexive learning, not a single method of observing In participant observation researchers typically become members of a culture, group, or setting, and adopt roles to conform to that setting. In doing so, the aim is for the researcher to gain a closer insight into the culture's practices, motivations and emotions. It is argued that the researchers' ability to understand the experiences of the culture may be inhibited if they observe without participating Some distinctive qualitative methods are the use of focus groups and key informant interviews. The focus group technique involves a moderator facilitating a small group discussion between selected individuals on a particular topic. This is a particularly popular method in market research and testing new initiatives with users/workers. Interpretive techniques The most common analysis of qualitative data is observer impression. That is, expert or bystander observers examine the data, interpret it via forming an impression and report their impression in a structured and sometimes quantitative form. Some qualitative data that is highly structured (e.g., open-end responses from surveys or tightly defined interview questions) is typically coded without additional segmenting of the content. In these cases, codes are often applied as a layer on top of the data. Quantitative analysis of these codes is typically the capstone analytical step for this type of qualitative data. Contemporary qualitative data analyses are sometimes supported by computer programs, termed Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software. These programs do not supplant the interpretive nature of coding but rather are aimed at enhancing the analysts efficiency at data storage/retrieval and at applying the codes to the data. Many programs offer efficiencies in editing and revising coding, which allow for work sharing, peer review, and recursive examination of data. Mechanical techniques Some techniques rely on leveraging computers to scan and sort large sets of qualitative data. At their most basic level, mechanical techniques rely on counting words, phrases, or coincidences of tokens within the data. Often referred to as content analysis, the output from these techniques is amenable to many advanced statistical analyses.

Questionnaire NAME AGE GENDER 1. How many hours do you surf the net in a day? (a) 1-3 (b) 4-6 (c) 7-9 (d) more than10 hours 2.1 Where do you surf the net? (a) Home (b) School/college (c)Office (d) Cyber caf 3. Which connectivity do you use? (a) Wi-Fi (b)Broadband (c) Mobile (d) Iptv 4. Which social networking sites you like the most? (a)Facebook (b) Twitter (c) My Space (d) Orkut (e) other specify 5. Which kind of advertisements attracts you the most (a) Print (b) Radio (c) Television (d) Hoardings/ Billboards (e)Internet

6. Have you ever been influenced by advertisements on social networking sites?

7. How was your experience you purchased from the influence of social networking sites? (a) Satisfied (b) Very satisfied (c) Not satisfied (d) N/A 8. Do you think the advertisements on social networking sites are attractive? (a) Yes (b) No

9. Other than advertising how do you like to purchase a product? (a) Peer influence (b) window shopping (c) any other, specify

10. Will you make another purchase as well? (a) Yes (b) No

11. Do you think that internet advertising is cost effective ? (a) somewhat (b) yes (c) no (d) cant say

Analysis

surfing time
15

10

50

The above chart shows that50% of the respondents spend 4-6 hours a day surfing net.25% spend 7-9 hours surfing net ,probably are the ones who surf net from the office.

preference for networkin sites

0 5
25

t itter
y space

15

55% respondents prefer Facebook,25% prefer my space and 15% prefer Orkut SNS.

55

rk t t ers specify

faceb

re t a 10

25

7-9

4-6

1-3

rs rs

rs rs

Kind of advertisement
15 15 print

20 35

TV h ar i ngs

The above chart shows that TV advertisement has great impact on the respondents. Internet advertisement is still to pick up. 20% of respondents are attracted to hoardings also.

ex erience of
5 10

rchase frm sns

60

n/a

60% of the respondents are satisfied with the Social networking sites.25% respondents are very satisfied with SNS.

25

n t satisfie

very satisfie

satisfie

 



Ra i

attraction of ads

20

yes

no

80

80% respondents are attracted with the ads on SNS.

cost effective
0

20 30
some what

yes no can't say

50

50%find that ads on SNS are cost effective.30% find it somewhat. It implies as this is a new concept it might get better response from the consumers.

Bibliography: 1. Social Networking Ad Spending Update 2. Social Networking World Maps 3. Economist.com - Word of mouse 4. Reuters - 'Brin says Google social network ad business "improving"' 5. Facebook Beacon Project