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Jules Lund: Facebook hooked in marketers like ‘junkies’

jules-lund22DayFM breakfast DJ Jules Lund today questioned the value of radio networks continually posting links to other people’s clickbait content on social media platforms now audiences are harder to reach.

Speaking at the National Radio Conference on the topic of Can social media survive monetisation?, Lund likened the need for marketers to “junkies”.

“This was the best model, and we should have seen it coming,” he said. ” Every brand on the planet was reaping better rewards than they have ever experienced. Then it changed and all of a sudden your first hit was free, and now little junkies you’ve got to cough up”.

He also accused creative agencies of “over complicating” content generated by influencers for brands.

Lund questioned what return many radio stations were seeing from social channels in the new social media landscape, suggesting “the age using social to get people to click through to your website is gone”.

And he posed the question of how, if it was costing people money to create content, and more money to distribute that on social, how they could monetise it, pointing to tie ups with brands and social media influencers.

Lund described social as the “lemonade stand of the future” where youngsters would use it to monetise their own social media communities.

Looking at the use of celebrity endorsements via tweets, where celebrities do not reveal they are being paid to tweet about a product or brand, he said whilst it is not illegal in Australia, it risks the person’s authenticity and the loyalty of their followers.

On whether it will be legislated he said: “I recon by the time a law has been floated, the audience will be able to spot a paid-for post a mile off.”

Talking of his own experiences with brands and content creating he said it was better to work directly with brands than creative agencies who want to make things too polished, risking the authenticity of the voice, and “over complicate the process”.

However, he admitted he did not always disclose where he has been paid by a brand where he felt that brand was a “good fit” for him as he could talk about it authentically, adding when looking for partners “there is no more authentic fit than a brand you’ve already bought”.

Turning to the amount of content being put up by brands, and the amount of memes and link to clickbait, he questioned what the benefit was, musing: “What if we only posted five times a week, and a couple of those week were sponsored?

“Imagine what we could create with that resource of money behind us.”

Alex Hayes is a guest of Commercial radio Australia at the National radio Conference

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