Opinions about Facebook’s new messaging system are flooding the media, but it’s obviously too early to determine how marketers will be impacted. Unfortunately, history has taught us to be cautious in our optimism about new technologies and platforms. Look no further than the launch of Google Buzz earlier this year when many marketers jumped the gun with adoption of the new application and started branding their websites with the “Buzz This” logo. It didn’t stop there: email campaigns quickly followed with companies incorporating the “Buzz” into regular communications. Many marketing hours were spent in haste, for an idea that fizzled.
However, the proposed communications unification and related efficiencies behind Facebook’s announcement certainly resonate with the marketing community. According to TechCrunch, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg defends the messaging system, saying “This is not an email killer. This is a messaging experience that includes email as one part of it. It’s all about making communication simpler. This is the way that the future should work.” The article by MG Siegler (@parislemon) describes the platform as “a way to communicate no matter what format you want to use: email, chat, SMS — they’re all included.” Continuing with, “all of this messaging is kept in a single social inbox. And all of your conversation history with people is kept.” According to Zuckerberg, the keys to what a modern messaging system needs include: seamless, immediate, personal and simple.
This notion of a single platform to capture interactions across communications channels throughout the customer life-cycle, including historical behavior and expressed preferences, is exactly how we built the Neolane platform. And creating a 360-degree marketing view of the customer and empowering one-to-one personalization across all inbound and outbound channels is the basis for our innovative conversational marketing technology – what we view as the evolution of traditional cross-channel marketing.
Consider this commentary by Forrester’s Augie Ray (@augieray) who states in his recent blog post that the Facebook messaging platform is “…. about facilitating and enhancing your personal relationships. Facebook wants to be the platform for personal communications…” To marketers, that sustainable, one-to-one personalized communication with customers and prospects is the holy grail. It’s also an important outcome from the use of conversational marketing technology.
We believe conversational marketing technology has the potential to be disruptive, to change the way marketers drive revenues through better planning, execution and measurement of campaigns. Drawing parallels to the Facebook criteria for a modern messaging system – Neolane empowers marketing communications to be immediate, seamless and personal. This is the way the future of marketing should work.
It’s certainly too early to determine how marketers will be impacted by Facebook’s new messaging system. But, as Augie Ray points out, Facebook certainly isn’t done innovating. And in our opinion, neither is Neolane.
Do you see Facebook messaging as a conversational innovation? Or just another idea that will fizzle fast?
