With the growing popularity of new and emerging media like the internet, especially among the youth, many soci?

[Smartee]

With the growing popularity of new and emerging media like the internet, especially among the youth, many social networking sites have emerged. For marketers targeting the youth, what are the advantages and disadvantages of such new media spaces? With relevant facts and figures, discuss the growth of internet as a medium of advertising, giving details of new growth avenues within the medium. Also, how is this going to affect conventional media companies?

[Chris D]

The internet can be a cheaper advertising space for products but magazines and newspapers still have high rates of sales with many opting to have a hard copy on paper because it is easier to read. Billboards also are still great mediums for expressing the value of your wares.

Besides, the internet has many millions of websites so it is alot less likely that you can get your message accross, not to mention that there are addons to the web browsers which stop ads from showing at all. The Printed media is still the king when it comes to advertising.

[TK]

I can assure you that none of my kids have ever mentioned to me that they saw something cool being marketed on one of these social networking sites that they needed/wanted to have. That's a very different reaction than I get when they listen to the radio or watch television. Whether it's because they have been conditioned to watch/listen, or whether it's for some other reason, they are more affected by advertising in those mediums.

They seem to understand or accept that advertisements are woven into and through tv and radio programs. Unlike me, they don't click to another channel or hit the button for another radio station. They watch/listen and the message gets absorbed even if they don't act on it. It's very different with the Internet. They are annoyed by the distractions of advertising on the web, which they seem to think is their own little club where advertisers are not wanted and should not be allowed to interfere with their quest to "connect" with other cyber-people.

As far as newspapers go, they all scour the movie section every weekend. if there's an article on a television show taht they watch, then they'll read that article. But they aren't searching for criticism, they are looking for affirmation that the show that they like is the best show in the world, or that the movie they want to go to is the funniest movie in the world. When I tell them that this or that got bad reviews, they treat my comments as a personal betrayal.

It's the same for sports. My sons don't want to hear about Manny's shortcomings, or a sportswriter's opinion that Kevin Garnett isn;t playing well. They want non-critical information, which I suppose is what the non-critical mind craves, and which is the essence of childhood or childishness. I think, as a corollary, that social networking sites for young people are popular because there is no critical examination of anything important or even semi-important.

These sites seem to provide acceptance and standing and "friendship" that isn't possible to achieve outside of the cyber-universe. I don't understand the point of it all to be perfectly honest. One good friend is worth more than a million cyber-friends in my view. But maybe that's just age talking.

Anyways, I have no facts or figures. I just don't get the sense that you get much bang for the buck targeting kids on the Internet. Adults may be a different story, but I know that Internet advertising holds no appeal for me.

That's my two cents worth of anecdote.