Think Social Network Ads Are a Waste of Money? Think Again.

According to Oneupweb’s Social Media Eye Tracking Study, search is going social and paid ads on Facebook, YouTube and in the future, Twitter are no waste of money.

Here’s what they said:
“We wanted to know if people actually look at ads when they are on social sites like Facebook and YouTube. Or in the case of Twitter, where will they likely look for those ads when they do begin to appear,” explains Oneupweb CEO and Founder Lisa Wehr. “We found that not only do users spend time viewing paid ads on social networking sites, they often look at these ads before actual search results.”

Some surprising statistics discovered:

• A whopping 65% of participants engaged with sponsored ads within the first 10 seconds of their search.
• Scan paths do not follow the order of the search result positions. Often, sponsored ads were looked at before the third or fourth result.
• There is not a significant difference in fixation duration across the first four results or sponsored ads on both Facebook and YouTube.
• 50% of participants were satisfied with their brand search on Twitter. Many liked that they could find the most current opinions about a product.

In order to succeed in yielding higher ROI when it comes to online ads, it is crucial for advertisers to understand users’ search patterns and behavior. So what does this study mean to advertisers?

1. Placement

Not only is it important for advertisers to decide whether social media is the most appropriate platform for the message, they also have to decide where is the most optimal placement to show their ads.

On Search Engines, users’ eye starts at the top left hand side of the page before moving downward and slightly to the right. Hence, advertisers must strive to be on the top 4 search results instead of placing itself as top sponsored links on the right column.

On social media networks, things are different. As mentioned above, when users search, their eyes land on sponsored ads before the third or fourth result. Who said your paid ads are not getting some love?

2. Considered YouTube?

When users were asked to do product searches on the 3 sites, 90% of them were satisfied with their results on YouTube while 63% and 50% of them were satisfied with Facebook and Twitter respectively. Users on YouTube also spend more time viewing related videos of their initial video clicks.

The result seems impressive for YouTube but not many companies are using it to promote themselves. If users are experiencing the greatest search satisfaction from YouTube, what are companies waiting for?