Is getting “more traffic” your real goal?
Who is winning the race to get more traffic?
This 14-year-old kid, Fred. He’s gotten MILLIONS of views! 45 million at last count.
This is what happens when you try to simply be entertaining.
If traffic is your goal, here’s the formula. Do something really stupid that’ll make people laugh.
Me? I’ll stick with having a few thousand people passionate about learning more from innovative technologists and other leaders.
Why not get into the traffic race? Because I’d rather be in the race for a smart, focused audience. That’s where the real action is.
It also says volumes about why YouTube is losing millions of dollars every month. They can’t monetize this kid, and THAT should tell you how much real value there is in having a big audience.
Back to business: anytime I get a company who asks me about my traffic I’ll show them this blog post first and ask the question about why they haven’t sponsored this kid’s show already, since he has already won the traffic game.
Powered By 
June 30th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Amazing stuff! The people behind these vids are going places.
June 30th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
But that kid has a sponsor, so he get paid for making his videos, even if YouTube doesn’t
June 30th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Fred is being sponsored by the ZipIt: http://fredonzipit.com/
The video you linked to offers that URL at the end, and my guess is that his audience is really hooked on what he’s doing.
As far as i can tell, this is a tightly scripted, well thought out production, rather that a fly by night video blogger who doesn’t have support from professionals and is making waves by just being silly/interesting.
Kudos to the production team/interactive agency. Very well done.
June 30th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Ahh just jealousy, you’d take the traffic if someone gave it to yah (and you’ve done quite wacky things in the past), and I seem to recall you going ga-ga over Ze Frank, which had the same inane hyperactive formula.
It’s like a car wreck, everyone looks, but not easy to sell the goods. That traffic is not the end all, be all, is something that everyone should have learnt from the first “eyeballs” dot.com (con) crash. But playing “only the “smart” people care and get it”, elite-games, is equally (and double) limiting.
As always, when traffic down, claim superiority of audience (we are better than you, nah nah nah), when traffic up, why it’s validation for whatever is the bug-hype of the moment. Shell con game, can’t ever lose.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
“Do something really stupid that’ll make people laugh.”
Do you ever what some of your videos, particularly the Qik ones? I thought that was what you are doing.
July 1st, 2008 at 1:40 am
It is an intersting point of view but Fred is already sponsored by Zipit, the Wireless messenger that Fred use in the video. There is an online store at: http://www.zipitwireless.com/default.aspx?skinid=1
It’s a interesting campaing, 2 milion of traffic on YouTube for these stupid videos are too much, i think. But it’s really viral. So, if Youtube can’t monetize this video and haven’t some revenue, we can imagine that Google closed YouTube in the future?
July 1st, 2008 at 4:10 am
Youtube will monetize the 4 billion monthly views. The day they start allowing Youtube producers to activated overlay ads, those ads will be relevant and popup in the bottom 10% of the video for a few seconds once per video or once every few minutes. Pehrpas Google will be able to use voice-recognition to improve the relevancy of those overlay ads.
Estimates of the monetization level that Google can achieve with those overlay ads being on the video on youtube.com, embedded and full screen is around 15 dollars per 1000 views. That is really huge. This means Fred would have earned 675 thousand dollars by now for his 45 million views, and Google would have probably made even more money cause their share is always larger then the content providers on Adsense.
July 1st, 2008 at 7:07 am
*twitches* a few million?
ok, my blog is not very huge, not very good, and enough other things “not very”, but i am able to greet every visitor by his name (and i do have no memory for names)
but i think i will be happy with a few people with the same interests as me,
July 1st, 2008 at 8:38 am
“Because I’d rather be in the race for a smart, focused audience.”
I’m offended by your assumption. Yeah, Fred is kooler…
July 1st, 2008 at 9:26 am
Traffic (or ‘eyeballs’ as we called it back then) was the goal of many ‘cool’ companies in the late ’90s and early 2000s. We all know what happened.
I’ll take the smart, more focused audience any day.
July 1st, 2008 at 11:16 am
This is nothing new. People have always been drawn to look at out of the ordinary things. That’s much more exciting than following a bunch of nerds talking web 2.0. What is your message here Scoble?
July 1st, 2008 at 2:48 pm
I would rather interact (deal) with a smart and focused audience than the type of people that are commenting on Fred’s youtube videos. Of course the conversation we are having is both about our personal interactions through social media, and then a companies interaction which have different values in both investment and return. But I do agree that engagement translates more value for both audiences (individual and company) than just pure traffic.
July 1st, 2008 at 5:27 pm
In other words, traffic is not necessarily a good measure of a websites value.
July 1st, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Robert, your post reminded me of a post I’ve been meaning to write for some time now. Simply put, I could not agree with you more.
It all comes down to goals: do you want the popularity? Can you monetize it if you get it? Or do you want to attract bright minds and talk to them about topics that interest you?
Great post. Thanks for kicking me in the ass to write my similar thoughts on the subject.
– Jeff
July 2nd, 2008 at 8:34 am
As we say in the radio biz “content is king.”
July 2nd, 2008 at 9:42 am
The trick is SUSTAINABLE traffic: 45 mil hits is worth nothing if it doesn’t keep coming back.
Websites should be sustainable organically growing businesses…NOT once-off pop hits that fade quickly.
July 2nd, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Getting traffic is NOT my real goal. If that was my objective, I would put 3 live webcams with Playboy playmates showing their pussies 24 hours a day. Also, I would upload this live onto YouTube. That would give me 400 million views in an hour. If you check out YouTube video average viewership, you will find that pornography, salacious entertainment and cheap stunts consistently average the most traffic.
Also, making money is NOT my real goal. If so, I would be selling crack cocaine and make more money in 1 week than even your mighty salary, your highness.
The crux is that we each of us wants to get views, traffic, money, etc. in our own tasteful manner that would give us satisfaction and self-esteem. “Parading like a clown before a webcam” personally does not appeal to me as a way of getting traffic or making money. YMMV. I don’t want those 40 million views.
Please don’t expound shallow philosophies on your blog, Mr. Scoble. Stick to tech and geek, and I’ll keep watching.
July 2nd, 2008 at 9:13 pm
I couldnt agree with you more on the need for quality audience, rather than pageviews.
Infact, the reader engagement is far more important and fruitful than anything else - it enriches one.
-Ashish.
http://www.pluggd.in
July 2nd, 2008 at 11:55 pm
YouTube will continue to evolve - it is in investment in the new revolution of communication. Eventually, it will find a way to make a profit from everything. But for now it is a new revolution that has to still evolve
July 3rd, 2008 at 1:42 am
You need to have the traffic coming back to your site, people are coming to your site only once is not much to bank in the end of the day.
July 3rd, 2008 at 4:36 am
Ummm how did you come to the conclusion that YouTube can’t monetize him? They sponsored him, he’s a YouTube partner, they have ads on his videos, so I guess you’d be wrong about that.
Sure advertisers really don’t care about traffic, not at all. And they also don’t care about magazine circulation numbers, or TV show viewership, or click through rates. All they care about is supporting creative people doing creative things no matter how little traffic they get. Yeah. Brilliant.
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:00 am
Oh, c’mon. Sour grape much. In fairness to Fred and his “traffic”, I think it takes an amount of creative intelligence to whip up those hilarious videos. It’s also not fair to say that the kind of audience he’s got isn’t focused and smart. He’s got a different kind of content for a different kind audience that is fit for a different kind of product. Wait till he does a video on the misadventures of chewing “Brand” gum..
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:46 am
In other words: You’d rather run a tech blog than an ordinary TV-channel?
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:58 am
I think what Robert is trying to point out is if a company wants to be popular, it should do a Fred stunt instead of spending millions on the old media. Fame is much “cheaper” now.
However, I guess it all depends on the product. If a viral video can drive the product’s growth, then you would’ve hit the jackpot. The real problem is relevance. Being a hard sell doesn’t help at all.
45 million views… That’s easily half the size of my country. In a mass market point of view (”reach”), that is tremendous. But on the web, it means nothing if it isn’t sustainable, as Keith pointed out.
July 3rd, 2008 at 8:59 am
Since most of my viewers are NOT that into You Tube, I dont worry about it. I have a few videos there but frankly, thats not where they go for most of information on Business Building.
Dr Wright
The Wright Place TV Show
http://www.wrightplacetv.com
http://www.twitter.com/drwright1
July 3rd, 2008 at 9:35 am
Nice post Scoble. I’m extra encouraged to post a comment today because I just finished reading your book Naked Conversations.
Online video will need a way to monetize viral videos that spread very fast usually without knowing the viral effect will occur. TV has it easy (or at least it used to), show the content to the advertisers, get sponsorship deals lined up in the spring and summer, air the shows in the fall, and everybody wins (except most of the advertisers of course because TV advertising isn’t effective, measurable, provides a poor ROI, etc.).
New systems will need to be put in place, I do see big potential in creative overlay ads at the bottom of the video screen, but scaling advertising inventory to match content inventory is something that needs to be more closely looked at. Especially with the Web getting more connected, social, interactive, collaborative, and community driven by passionate individuals.
I’m personally obsessed with online video, and love working with new media models in the emerging Web 2.0 jungle.
July 3rd, 2008 at 10:17 am
Actually, for a 14 year-old, “Fred” has made some pretty decent money.
We interviewed him over at NewTeeVee:
http://newteevee.com/2008/06/25/fred-speaks-to-ntv-squeaky-voice-not-included/
Rather than waiting for YouTube to monetize his work, Fred got a manager and they monetized it on their own.
Fred got a five figure deal with Zipit to do three “viral” vids. There were performance benchmarks bonuses built into the deal for 1 million, 1.5 million, etc. plays. He beat all of those benchmarks in a week.
Fred’s launching his own URL this month where he’ll offer merchandise and further monetize the character. Plus, he’s had meetings with execs at Fox and Disney.
He’s not simply entertaining, the kid’s got a plan, and it’s working out pretty well.
July 3rd, 2008 at 10:53 am
It’s not always the stupid gimmick stunts, as Limbaugh’s $38 million a year, until the sun goes supernova, attests.
July 3rd, 2008 at 11:54 am
[...] guy is amazing. He is only 14 years old, yet he has more than 40m video views in total. His YouTube channel has been viewd almost 6m times and he has more than a quarter of a [...]
July 3rd, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Huh, and to think I’ve been wasting all this time with site promotion and social networking when all I had to do was act like a complete moron.
July 3rd, 2008 at 1:30 pm
[...] certainly something easily measured. While these measurements have some value I agree with Scoble and Seth, it’s the who and more importantly, the what, that really [...]
July 3rd, 2008 at 1:49 pm
[...] Scoble has a great post about a 14 year old kid with 45 million viewers on YouTube. [...]
July 3rd, 2008 at 2:04 pm
[...] Seth Godin and Robert Scoble talk about a video by Fred. When you look at all the views of his videos he has over 45 million [...]
July 3rd, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Novelty plays a big part in the popularity of stuff like this. The novelty is, anyone old enough to buy a computer has spent most of his/her life in a world where broadcast video was made by capital-P Professionals. If we expect professionalism, and we get some kid being a dork, the thing that makes us laugh isn’t the dorkiness–it’s the fact that it’s being broadcast!
Thanks to YouTube, amateur-grade video is changing from a novelty to a norm. Once we get used to broadcast dorkiness, it won’t make us laugh anymore. After that, anyone who wants a big audience–or a small audience from a desirable demographic–will actually have to make a good video.
July 4th, 2008 at 2:03 am
fred´s video made me really really sad
is that supposed to be funny?
i don´t see the point, i must be too old, or to snotty, or whatever
keep on eating sh*t!
…………. 45 million flies can´t all be wrong!!
let´s keep on monetizing the “bread and circus”dudes!
cheers
July 4th, 2008 at 9:41 am
[...] Dedicated to the most recent (and extremely annoying), wonder boy, Fred. [...]
July 4th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
I do MLM and found the hard way, that traffic alone is no measure of quality leads.
For that matter buying leads is even worse!
Get your own leads for free.
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LynnRothfuss
lynnrothfuss@gmail.com
lynnrothfuss.successin10steps.com
http://www.youtube.com/lynnrothfuss
July 4th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
[...] 4, 2008 Scobleizer recently blogged about Fred, a 14-year old kid who’s gotten over 40 million views on youtube for his [...]
July 4th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
[...] pm on Julho 4, 2008 | # | Etiquetas HTML:copiando Scoble has a great post about a 14 year old kid with 45 million viewers on [...]
July 4th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
Fred…
Strange, but the first thing that comes to my mind is/was the musicgroup Milli Vanilli.
I think the same pretending-strategy created by clever marketingpeople without a real soul (:o)) that gave birth to Milli Vanilli (and maybe half of the worlds popular singers) is getting bigger everyday on the Internet.
Just like Fred! :o)
July 4th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
[...] Scobble is always the first to run after any new web hype; but not this time; instead of trying to understand what makes that kid so successful he plays it down: “This is [...]
July 4th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
As mentioned above Fred is a partner with youtube as most of the top 100 most subscribed are. Youtube thus makes money of them buy showing CPM or PPC adsense ads. Now who knows if these pay the hosting bill but it’s an attempt.
It seems that this is the future as they see it or at least part of the puzzle. I don’t know if it will pay the whole bill but as they move their non DMCA offending video posters to promoted status they have more ability to make money if it works out who knows.
But if you are smart you have the ability to drive alot of traffic from youtube. and if can be ultra targeted. In that lies the great youtube secret.
July 5th, 2008 at 12:37 am
[...] nicht so mit dem Fred-Phänomen; statt dass er versucht, dem Phänomen Fred auf die Spur zu kommen, spielt er es herunter: “Dahin kommt man, wenn man einfach nur versucht, unterhaltsam zu sein. Falls Sie es sich zum [...]
July 5th, 2008 at 4:30 am
“The type of people that are commenting on Fred’s youtube videos.”?
They’re called teenagers. And yes, you’re old now.
July 5th, 2008 at 4:42 am
And what happens in 5 years time when Fred realises he is not going to be the next Jim Carey and turns up at Goldmans/PWC/etc looking for a “normal” job. Does this help or hinder his employment prospects!?
July 5th, 2008 at 11:29 am
[...] it does - He has already grown into a really BIG mini star. But is YouTube is smart enough to cash in on Fred? And it is not that Fred has done great for a single video - he is doing great in all the videos [...]
July 5th, 2008 at 11:55 am
I watched this guy’s videos last week. I sat through two of them and my GF was asking me to mute that ridiculous noise. I don’t understand it. The top YouTube channels are all a bunch of kids doing dumbass stupid videos.
So that’s my rant :)
July 5th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
[...] Is getting “more traffic” your real goal? : I would agree with my favourite blogger rober scoble. You gotta read the rest [...]
July 5th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
What you want is to Attract Targeted traffic. Social Networking (Web 2.0) is a great way to do this. YouTube is just one of many social sites, such as Facebook, Digg, etc.
July 6th, 2008 at 9:05 am
[...] for how to do things properly next time around. And today, in Who vs. how many, he picks up on Robert Scoble’s post against the rush to audience and provides us with this “quote of the day” [...]
July 6th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
[...] Scobleizer ? Tech geek blogger » Blog Archive Is getting ?more traffic? your real goal? «… - [...]
July 6th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
Bingo! Traffic was a numbers game back in 2000, although smart marketers always knew that website traffic is about getting people to your site who love what you are talking about and VISIT OFTEN.
“Wham-Bam-Thank-you-Ma’am ain’t so great online either. Give me thousands of people who subsscribe or opt-in b/c they care over millions of one-hit wonders anyday.
Just my .02
Karen Miner Hurd
http://www.MLMmaniac.com
July 6th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Think of traffic as a room fall of blank faces, all waiting for a moment of genius to come forward. If you don’t offer it, they will reject you and after awhile they will find another to stare and wait.
Today you figured out something that most have known but rarely talk about. Fame is a shallow guage for acceptance amongst peers whom are preoccupied with their own fame to notice.
Right now, I’ll be honest, I find you 70% noisey and 30% signal. The 30% signal are usually the random videos that you go into off the cuff, without some agenda.. That’s what will keep me staring at your videos for 20mins+, i don’t mind spending 180mins with Scoble TV provided that there is something worth viewing.
I’m a viewer, but you make it tough at times to view. Then you have moments and all is forgiven? 14yr kid has 45million views, how many are repeat visitors.. and why..is more the curious metric there..
Don’t be a news anchor, be a industry street reporter :)
-
Scott Barnes
Rich Client Platform Manager
Microsoft.
July 7th, 2008 at 4:47 am
[...] in the blogosphere, had a brief exchange that got me thinking. (You can read Scoble’s post here and Seth’s post here.) In short, both agreed that the number of exposures (hits, traffic) is [...]
July 7th, 2008 at 7:21 am
[...] Seth Godin pointed me to Scobleizer’s post entitled: “Is getting ‘more traffic’ your real goal?” [...]
July 7th, 2008 at 10:14 am
[...] calculated that the Fred videos have been watched a total of 48 million times. Robert Scoble may call it stupid, but I think that is selling short the very clever and deliberate ascent to stardom of this [...]
July 7th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
[...] Godin and Robert Scoble both wrote about this recently… The value of having a niche [...]
July 8th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Let me play devil’s advocate - there have been highly successful mass market campaigns that have done a good job at marketing mass appeal products and services.
If you have a niche product then of course you are better aligning it to your niche audience - your cost of doing business will be much lower and response rate much higher.
If you have a mass appeal consumer good or service, then using mass market publicity like these videos is certainly worth the try - and given how much it is costing - likely very profitable.
Jeff
July 17th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
[...] Seth Godin and Robert Scoble speech most a recording by Fred. When you countenance at every the views of his videos he has over [...]
July 21st, 2008 at 12:48 am
[...] that people watch for about a week (more if you’re lucky), and then just forget about. Google continues to struggle with Youtube because they can’t figure out how to monetize something that’s been seen by 30 million [...]
July 23rd, 2008 at 1:14 am
[...] mere kan læses på Blogscoped , hos Scoble og i LA Times. Alt i alt viser det sig at knægten har over 45 millioner views på Youtube (sikkert [...]
August 8th, 2008 at 8:32 pm
[...] Seth Godin and Robert Scoble talk about a video by Fred. When you look at all the views of his videos he has over 45 million [...]