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Yahoo! Partners With Twitter For Social Media Integration

Nielsen announced today a set of impressive new social media statistics - in December 2009, consumers spent 82 percent more time on social networking sites compared to the same period a year ago.

The average global consumer now spends more than 5 and 1/2 hours on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, up from 3 hours in December 2008. In correlation, the overall traffic to social networking sites by unique visitors increased as well from 242 millions to 307 millions.

The statistics deducted at global consumers, however, it only refer to a select group of countries, including U.S., U.K., Australia, Brazil, Japan, Switzerland, Germany, France, Spain and Italy.

A shift in Social Media Measurement expectation is significant in 2010; CMOs indicate a 300% year-over-year increase in the number of companies that plan to measure social media’s impact on conversion and a 400% increase in the number of companies that will track social media’s direct impact on revenues.

According to a recent survey by retail research organization NPD Group in Canada, found consumers plan to spend no more in 2009 than they did one year ago, during the global recession. Consumers trying to do their holiday shopping on a budget are being targeted this year, more than ever before, by viral marketing through social-media websites such as Facebook and Twitter, as businesses try to find new ways to connect with customers.

Chain Retailers like Walmart and Home Depot gave exclusive offers and discounts to followers of their own Twitter and Facebook pages. It’s just one example of how holiday marketing is melding with new media. Sports retailer Golf Town, has launched what the company calls its “most aggressive social media initiative to date” for the holiday season: the “12 Tweets of Christmas” campaign, featuring a dozen exclusive deals for its online followers on the micro-blogging website Twitter in the lead-up to Dec. 25th.

“Marketing budgets are smaller than they were a year ago, and social-media marketing work generally takes more time than money,” says Darren Barefoot, co-author of the book Friends with Benefits: A Social Media Marketing Handbook. “The consumer really wants information and that’s the thing that the web does really well. . . . The best retailers are going to be using that really smartly to get people into their stores.”

Percent of 2009 Inc. 500 Company interviewed that Monitored Brand on Social Media Sites.

2007 – 50% (- - -)

2008 – 60% (↑10%)

2009 – 68% (↑8%)

Source: UMASS Dartmouth, Social Media in the 2009 Inc 500: New Tools & New Trends

The popularity of social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, have led users to stop looking for coupon bargains in the newspapers, but online. In fact, people have been creating their own virtual community of bargain hunters.

Kelly Wallace, citing shopping experts, said social networking is guaranteed to save at least 15 to 20% on your shopping bill — and even as much as 30% if you’re really looking for bargains.

In these tough economic times, more and more people are using their computers to save money from all different kinds of discount/deals/offers. Last year, massive online marketing campaigns in Twitter with online deals had caused 1430% increase of Twitter users within a month. A great deal may just be a click away.

“Dell sold millions of dollars of computers using Twitter and social media, so it’s for all types of products.” The use of online coupons has jumped an astounding 172% between this year and last, according to Tiffany Ivanovsky, one of the “deals pro” who will offer tips and tricks on how to save for free in the social community portal.