Whether because of the recession, or the rising celebrity of social media, or both, this past year has rapidly increased the intention of marketers to migrate dollars to the internet.

Based on an Ipsos Reid, Media Mix Survey, the National Post reports:

81% of marketers said they planned to increase their spending online, while 49% said they expected to boost what they were shelling out for mobile marketing on cellphones and smartphones…

That could amount to a lot more money being spent online than the meager 11% of marketing budgets reported earlier this year by the IAB.

 Who’s going to lose out? You already know the answer:

Advertisers said they planned to cut their spending on traditional media in the coming year, with 41% of advertisers expecting to cut back on print marketing, while 26% anticipated slashing their spending on radio ads and 22% planned to pare back their television advertising budgets.

Online marketing budgets have been out of sync with the sheer numbers of consumers online for awhile. For example, according to Comscore (July ’09), 16 million Canadians spend no less than an hour a day on Facebook alone. That’s close to 50% of the entire population. What’s more and according to the same report, 48% of users between the ages of 35 and 54 use Facebook more than any other communication tool, including the cell phone.

So, I suppose the rush to internet marketing and social media has started. The problem is in understanding what to do, how to go about it and what it actually costs.

Sure, many think social media is free. But is it really?

The fundamentals of marketing still apply. And as much as the “conversation” meme has made its rounds, don’t fall for it. Marketing is still persuasion whether it’s online or not. Perhaps a different, more engaging, creative and even outrageous type of persuasion. But persuasion all the same.

Though, as with any medium, social media marketing has its own way of being produced successfully. It requires listening to what people are talking about. It requires participating in those shared points of conversation , or passion points. It requires ideas, or social objects, or better yet, objects of conversation that people will pass around. Perhaps even more so, given the nature of personal media space and that it’s entirely up to the audience whether they want to interact with you or not.

Everything’s equal on this playing field. And most won’t tolerate brand egotism, or self-aggrandizing behaviour, so much.

So, for a brand to be successful, it’s best that it behaves entirely different than what is common practice in traditional media, or you might just get a punch in the nose. Or worse, ignored.

Therefore, social media if done well, is not free. Beyond ideas, it requires strategy, planning, writing, design, technology, programming, measurement and sustainability. It requires people who know what they’re doing. It requires a commitment of time. Because, it doesn’t function based on an in/out traditional 13-week campaign flight.

Hence, the migration of media dollars to labor dollars. Somebody’s got to create build and maintain these marketing programs. And, as with everything - all ideas are not created equal. Neither does everything perform equal. So, I doubt the executive assistant can pull it off. Or the nerdy nephew in the basement, for that matter.

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