Movies do it, television does it, even print advertisers do it. Product placement is one of the quieter, but more common and popular advertising methods out there. All of the big companies do it. You’ll see Nike in television sportscasts, Coca-Cola cans in movies, etc. So why not in social media too?
Udorse.com is a startup based in New York and funded by the Founders Fund that thinks we should be able to do just that.
If you’re social network profile on, say, Facebook or Myspace has a photo section with pictures that include products, Udorse wants you to be able to tag those with corporate sponsors who appear in them and make money every time someone views the pic.
Sounds like a good idea to me. The new wave of online marketing appears to be focused on social media. With good reason, since sites like Facebook are now rivaling Google in number of visits per day. In fact, recent surveys show that most people who connect online regularly do so through social networking portals like Twitter and Facebook than they do through any other medium.
The site is still in beta. Using a basic affiliate marketing backbone, Udorse currently works only with Facebook, but is a great concept. Advertisers/companies sign up to make affiliate sales or PPC advertisements through Udorse. The rest of us sign up for Udorse, look at who’s advertising, and then tag appropriate photos with the affiliate links.
This would also, obviously, encourage people to find out who’s advertising and then create photos featuring that company’s products or logo so they can make the tag.
In the end, I don’t see the average Joe Facebook user making much money off of this, but I do see advertisers really getting somewhere with this idea. Udorse is very new, of course, and don’t be surprised if it isn’t bought up by one of the large affiliate marketing firms like Commission Junction and integrated with their services.
In order to try Udorse, you’ll need a private beta invite code, which you can request from their site directly.
