"Share of voice" revenue model: the solution for social networks?

wallen.typepad.com

4 pointscyno3 comments

I don't understand the business model. Why would I proactively want to follow random companies?

If I understand correctly, the revenue model is roughly:

Joe's Dance Club uses Twitter and Facebook to post news about shows. They want to promote these news feeds so that more customers will subscribe and hear about their cool shows. They pay Twitter and Facebook to "promote" their accounts in some way (maybe by ranking it higher in "things you might be interested in" suggestions, or featuring it on the homepage, or something).

I think it's hard to earn money this way without losing trust and compromising the product for your real users - just like paid placement in pre-Google web search.

As long as you show clearly what is sponsored or not, you do not lose the trust of your users. In addition, it needs not be the one paid most that gets more promoted but a mix of price and endorsement/quality - basically the same caveat as sponsored linked on Google.

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