LinkedIn is the social network to watch, not Facebook, says Possible’s global CEO
Marketers must look beyond Facebook and Twitter to social networks like LinkedIn for future opportunities, according to global CEO of WPP-owned agency Possible, Shane Atchison.
Speaking to The Drum Atchison said that LinkedIn could help inject valuable inventory into the mobile space – an area which remains untapped.
“When you look at the analysis of traffic over 30 per cent now comes from mobile devices yet I don’t have a client that spends more than 5 per cent form their digital budget on mobile experiences – I’m still scratching my head on that. It may be partly due to there not being enough inventory in mobile, which is something social networks like Facebook, but even more so on LinkedIn,” he said.
Atchison believes people are more likely to be honest about their profiles on LinkedIn than on Facebook, because it’s closely tied to their careers. “There is more incentive to be honest and transparent about who you are given prospective employers use it. I use it whenever I need to hire someone and I check the LinkedIn page ahead of more or less every meeting I have,” he said.
There is a risk that the older a person becomes the less attracted they will be to Facebook, suffering from what Atchison describes as “Facebook fatigue”.
“I suspect people will be more serious with other platforms like LinkedIn. Facebook will become the birthday network, because it’s most relevant to you on your birthday – it’s no longer relevant on a day-to-day basis.”
Meanwhile the data that can be garnered from LinkedIn, including where a company is based, what their goal is, all will typically opt in to share that, and that’s more substantial than other data points. If someone gets a promotion – there could be ways to make that transactional, according to Atchison.
“People still think of LinkedIn as a place to find employees but for marketers there is more there in terms of data resource and commercial opportunities,” he said.
Possible has been focusing on beefing up its European workforce, having grown from 50 to 700 people in Europe over the last year, all of whom are digital specialists, according to Atchison.
His comments follow the news that Possible has formed a “strategic collaboration” with Wildfire – a division of Google - which will see a global rollout of Wildfire’s social marketing suite for enterprises across Possible’s client base. The move is aimed at helping advertisers maximise returns on their social marketing strategies.