Michael Tadlock

Director Product Management – Y!OS

The Rise of Social Referrals

Social Referrals = More, Better, Leads

“For the 1st time ever, more people are finding my blog from Twitter and Facebook referrals than via Google.  The total number of people coming to my blog is increasing”

- Mark Cuban – Owner Dallas Mavericks & Internet Investor – 5/14/09

“We have investments in about 25 portfolio companies… Google continued to be a dominant source of traffic (in referral trend analysis)… Facebook and Twitter (referrals) are growing at 30 to 40 percent per month… they’re getting close to 20% of Google… The combined power of Facebook & Twitter will surpass Google for many sites in the next year"

- Fred Wilson - Flatiron Partners & Union Square Ventures – 5/22/09

“…page views increased 75% year-over-year, with individual page views per person going up 55% in the same time period. Internal data reveals page view increases were driven by an increase in users sharing and consuming content via social media tools like Twitter and Yahoo! Buzz.”

- USAToday Press Release – 5/14/09

Social Referrals Produce Loyal Users

http://mashable.com/2009/10/06/study-traffic-sources/

Social Referrals Drive Engagement

Most traffic to Yahoo! Local comes from search and Yahoo.com

Users from Yahoo! 360 were 50 times more likely to participate

Search Referrals

(paid + organic)

Social Referrals vs. Search

Search Referrals

(paid + organic)

Social R

eferrals

Quantity Value

$

$$$$$(loyalty and

participation)

Today’s Social Referrals Are Mostly Link Shares

Link Shares Are The ‘Fast Food’ Of Social Referrals

Offer ‘Fast Food’ And ‘Fine Dining’ to Maximize Return

+

“Mike shared foo link” +

“Mike rated foo”

“Mike commented on foo”

“Mike uploaded foo”

“Mike created foo”

“Mike is a fan of foo”

Etc. Etc. Etc.

Fast Food And Fine Dining Are Both Important“In

teresting

ness”

Of U

pd

ate# o

f U

sers

Consume Participate Produce

Fast Food Fine Dining

Click Through Rate

Fine Dining in Four Courses

Distribution

Consumption

Production

Conversion

Failure in any course ruins the entire meal!

Production

Distribution

Consumption

Production

Conversion

Leverage Existing Participation

Add

Album Rating

Answer

Install

Blog Comment

Blog Post

Buzz Up

Bookmark

Comment

Connect

Create

Event Attend

Favorite

Follow

Join

Location

Note

Photo Upload

Playlist

Profile Update

Rating

Review

We found more than 150 publishable ‘verbs’ on the Yahoo! Network

Give The User A Voice

Fast food:

Fine dining :

Include Meta Data

Distribution

Distribution

Consumption

Production

Conversion

Support Many Outlets. Promote Few.

How to choose:

1) Look at http referrers2) Log what Tom has used

Tom

Use Tools With Bundled Distribution

Key metric: referrals per update produced

Know Which Users Offer The Highest Return

Consumption

Distribution

Consumption

Production

Conversion

Include Media, Especially Photos

Updates with photos are clicked on 4.5 times more often than updates without photos.

Conversion

Distribution

Consumption

Production

Conversion

Show The User What They Expect To See

Beware of Comment Pagination

Consider A Public View

Think through all four coursesas the user will experience them

Acknowledge The Relationship

Four Course Recap

1. Production– Leverage existing user participation

– Give the user a voice

– Include relevant meta data

2. Distribution– Support many outlets. Promote the relevant few.

– Use tools with built-in distribution

– Identify your high value users

3. Consumption– Publish meta-data, especially images

4. Conversion– Show the user what they expect to see

– Acknowledge the relationship

– Round the corner

Three Key Take Aways

1. Social referrals are growing and valuable

+

2. ‘Fast food’ and ‘fine dining’ to maximize return

3. Four important courses to ‘fine dining’

And Now The Shameless Plug

1. Yahoo! Updates will generate billions of social referrals in the next 12 months

120 MM Users 330 MM Users 300 MM Users

2. The Yahoo! Updates platform is open. http://developer.yahoo.com/updates

3. How many referrals will lead users to your application?

Thank you! – Ask A Yahoo! For Updates Handouts

http://developer.yahoo.com/updates/

Mike Tadlock – mtadlock@yahoo-inc.com