Social networks enter the Spiders’ web
The 13th Golden Spiders internet awards took place in Dublin this weekend and – as has been said – if the internet can be best measured using dog years, then these awards are 91 years old.
For many, it will seem that long since the first Spiders event was held in the Berkeley Court Hotel in Dublin in 1997.
Damian Ryan, founder of the event, recalls that there was huge buzz around the event as it was the first time the online ‘industry’ had assembled in one venue at the same time.
Ironically, there is no online archive of winners from 1997 to 2004, but early winners included ESB, the Irish Times, Adnet and – very much ahead of its time – the Virtual Irish Pub. These were the days of early adopters using slow dial-up connections.
Then, at the start of the 21st century, we saw the dotcom boom and bust, with winners going on to become very well known: homegrown internet success stories such as MyHome.ie, Daft.ie, Carzone.ie and Pigsback.com. This period was defined by high valuations and low broadband penetration.
Recent changes have seen the Spiders introduce new categories in the areas of digital media, social networking and blogging. Last year, the most noticeable trend was towards the use of multimedia, with TV3’s video-rich website winning the grand prix.
This year’s overall prize went to Muzu.tv, while other winners included ESB with Culgreen.ie, O2 with Bethedifference.ie, Lightbox with Whoseview.ie and Pix.ie. The founder of payments service Realex, Colm Lyon, won the Internet Hero 2009 award.
The judging criteria required brands to extend their user engagement beyond their website and to become involved in conversations with a wider audience on social networks and other sharing websites. Nominees needed to demonstrate a clear vision of how they listened and participated in these market places of opinion.
One of the judges, Eamonn Fallon, chief executive of Daft.ie, said sites were judged on design, speed, accessibility, breadth of content, business model, innovation, user generated content and social features.
‘‘Sites like whoseview.ie, Pix.ie and Muzu.tv are all excellent examples of sites that are executing well in this area,” he said. It is very difficult for companies to ‘manufacture’ these conversations, let alone control them, however careful consideration of their content strategy helps.
Among those nominated for an award were conversations about restaurant reviews, photos of smiling babies, highlights of Ireland’s rugby grand slam achievement, a calculator helping to reduce carbon footprints, and a multiplayer game for a new car launch.
The question for marketing personnel is whether their online activity creates content that people will bother commenting on and sharing, and whether they are using the appropriate technologies and channels to distribute this content.
Apart from social media, the other hot topics on the night were the power struggle between traditional agencies and digital agencies, the effect on the sector of traditional agencies taking digital work in house, the ongoing problem for small businesses of late and nonpayment of invoices, complaints about a lack of appropriate metrics for consumer engagement, and predictions for a tough 2010.
While not suffering as much as other industries, there is still clearly anxiety and some pain with the digital sector. But, on a positive note, the industry is still at a very early stage in Ireland. Digital media that engages and empowers its audience will prosper as we enter a golden age of consumer control.
