A STUDY ON SOCIAL NETWORK SITES MARKETING THE CASE OF GOONLINE.VN

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
SCHOOL OF BUSINESS


HO ANH DUNG


A STUDY ON SOCIAL NETWORK SITES MARKETING
THE CASE OF GOONLINE.VN




MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION THESIS






Hanoi – 2010

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
SCHOOL OF BUSINESS


HO ANH DUNG


A STUDY ON SOCIAL NETWORK SITES MARKETING

THE CASE OF GOONLINE.VN


Major: Business Administration
Code: 60 34 05

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION THESIS


Supervisor: Dr Vu Anh Dung

November, 2010
vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I
ABSTRACT II
TÓM TẮT IV
TABLE OF CONTENTS VI
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS X
LIST OF FIGURES XI
LIST OF TABLES XII
INTRODUCTION 1
1. RESEARCH BACKGROUND 1
2. RESEARCH OBJECTIVES 1
3. RESEARCH QUESTIONS 2
4. SCOPE OF WORK 2
5. DATA SOURCE 3
6. METHODOLOGY 3

7. SIGNIFICANCE 3
8. RESULTS 3
9. THESIS STRUCTURE 3
CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL FOUNDATION 5
1.1 BASIC OF SOCIAL NETWORK SITE MARKETING 5
1.2 HISTORY OF SOCIAL NETWORK SITES 6
1.3 TYPE OF SNS 9
1.4 FUNCTION OF SNS 11
1.4.1 Share 11
1.4.2 Show 12
1.4.3 Socialize 12
vii

1.4.4 Advertising & Sale 12
1.5 OVERVIEW OF SNS MARKETING FROM THE SITE MASTER PERSPECTIVE. 13
1.51 Steps in SNS marketing 15
1.5.2 The way to interact with users 20
1.6 HOW TO GET BENEFIT THROUGH SNS 27
1.6.1 Create website 28
1.6.2 Virtual Shop(e-commerce) 28
1.6.3 Speculate the domain name 28
1.6.4 Send spam 29
1.6.5 Read advertising news 29
1.6.6 Hack account 29
1.6.7 Play game 30
1.6.8 Selling virtual property 30
1.7 CORE FACTORS FOR SUCCESSFUL SNS 30
1.7.1 Social Object 31
1.7.2 Relationship & Privacy 32
1.7.3 User Interface 34

1.7.4 Community Management 34
1.7.5 Collective Intelligence 35
1.7.6 Application Programming Interface (API) 36
1.7.7 Evolution 37
CHAPTER 2: THE CASE OF GOONLINE.VN PORTAL 39
2.1 OVERVIEW OF SNS IN VIETNAM 39
2.2 INTRODUCTION ABOUT GOONLINE.VN 44
2.3 STRUCTURE OF GOONLINE.VN 49
2.3.1 GoOnline.vn design 49
2.3.2 Font 49
viii

2.3.3 Main features 49
2.3.4 Additional features 49
2.4 INTERACTING WITH USERS 49
2.5 TOOL TO MAKE MONEY 51
2.6 THE LIMITATIONS OF GOONLINE.VN 52
2.6.1 Core platform and Content 52
2.6.2 Product 55
2.6.3 Marketing 55
2.6.4 Human resource 56
2.6.5 Appearance 56
2.6.6 Design and User Experience 56
2.6.7 The way to make money 57
2.7 COMPARISION GOONLINE.VN WITH CORE SUCCESSFUL FACTORS 57
2.7.1 Social Object 59
2.7.2 Relationship and privacy 59
2.7.3 User Interface 60
2.7.4 Community Management 60
2.7.5 Collective Intelligence (CI) 60

2.7.6 API 61
2.7.7 Evolution 61
CHAPTER 3: SOLUTIONS TO IMPROVE GOONLINE.VN 64
3.1 SOLUTIONS 64
3.1.1 Social Object 64
3.1.2 Relationship & Privacy 64
3.1.3 User Interface 67
3.1.4 Community Management 67
3.1.5 Collective Intelligence 68
ix

3.1.6 Application Programming Interface (API) 68
3.1.7 Evolution 71
3.1.8 Solution to get more benefits 71
3.1.9 Other solutions 72
3.2 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY 80
3.3 CONTRIBUTION OF THE STUDY 81
3.4 FUTURE OF THE STUDY 81
CONCLUSION 83
REFERENCE 84

x

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

API
:
APPLICATION PROGRAMMING INTERFACE

CEO
:
CHIEF ENTERPRISE OFFICER



CPM
:

COST PER MILE





CPC
:
COST PER CLICK





CPA
:
COST PER ACTION





FPT
:
FPT CORPORATION

MIC
:
MINISTRY OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS
SEO
:
SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION



SEM
:
SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING



SNS
:
SOCIAL NETWORK SITES




UX
:
USER EXPERIENCE

VC CORP
:
VIETNAM COMMUNICATION CORPORATION

VNG
:
VINAGAME CORPORATION




VTC
:
VIETNAM TELECOMMUNICATIONS JOINT STOCK COMPANY




xi

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1.1. Timeline of the launch dates of many major SNS and dates
when community sites re-launched with SNS features 8
Figure 2.1. Bounce rate of Facebook 40
Figure 2.2. Daily Traffic Rank Trend of Zing.vn 42
Figure 2.3. Daily traffic rank trend of GoOnline.vn 51
Figure 2.4. Time which users spend on GoOnline.vn 54
Figure 2.5. Time which users spend on Facebook.com 54
Figure 2.6. Bounce rate of GoOnline.vn 58

Figure 2.7. The trend of GoOnline.vn 62
Figure 3.1. The daily pageviews per user of Facebook 70
Figure 3.2. The daily pageviews per user of GoOnline.vn 70
Figure 3.3. The percentage of site visits of GoOnline.vn 79




xii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.1. Percent of Search Traffic amd Querry of Zing music 43
Table 3-1. The upstream traffic of GoOnline.vn 75
Table 3-2. Percentage of GoOnline’s traffic 77
1
INTRODUCTION

1. Research background
Nowadays, Social Network Site (SNS) has become a phenomenon. In
recent years, millions of SNS have appeared and the growth of SNS seems not
to slow down. Many users (Microsoft Corp, Disney Corp…) have used SNS
for their marketing activities and many of them have obtained successes.
Microsoft, Disney
1
are typical examples. Besides, thousands of small and
medium companies also succeeded in using SNS marketing
2

In Vietnam, this trend has just been raised for 5 years

3
. However, the
effectiveness of using SNS as a social marketing tool for users/subscribers is
still an issue. VTC Online is one of the leading companies who first develop
SNS– GoOnline.vn – and to do business with the site. Though making some
achievements, VTC is still finding ways to effectively promote their SNS
GoOnline.vn and from that to gain more benefits from the site. That are
reasons I choose to study SNS marketing with the case of GoOnline.vn.
2. Research objectives
The main objective of this thesis is to study SNS marketing – focusing
on the case of GoOnline.vn. By analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the
site by comparing with other SNS, the author proposes some solutions to
improve the SNS GoOnline.vn.vn and from that to explore effective ways to


1
Link

2
Link
3
Link

2
create more value for both subscribers/users and VTC Corporation (the owner
of the SNS GoOnline.vn).
3. Research questions
Based upon the research objective, the main question for this study is
―How can VTC Corporation improve the SNS GoOnline.vn to add more value
for both subscribers/users and itself?‖ In order to answer this question, the

research needs to answer the following subquestions:
What is the SNS and how to benefit from the SNS?
What are strengths and weaknesses of the SNS GoOnline.vn in terms of
creating value to both subscribers/users and the site owner VTC
Corporation?
How can VTC corporation can improve the SNS GoOnline.vn to add
more value for both subscribers/users and itself?
4. Scope of work
The thesis studies the theoretical foundation for SNS arisen by Internet
companies since 2005 when SNS became a worldwide phenomenon. For the
case GoOnline.vn, the author focuses the study on the period from April
2010, the time when the GoOnline.vn was launched, to present (October
2010).
The term ―value‖ in this study applies for both subscribers/users of the
SNS and the owner of the SNS. For subscribers/users, value means the
contents, fuctions and tools that the SNS offers for subscribers/users to benefit
from. For the SNS owner, it is the ways that the SNS charges its stakeholders
3
for an amount of money for using the SNS.
5. Data Source
For the theoretical part, data sources are textbooks, articles from Internet.
As for the case study, data is obtained from discussing with GoOnline.vn’s
staffs and managers team and internal data, which are being tracked by
Google Analytics.
6. Methodology
The thesis use the empirical method, compare with other sites in the
study process and discuss with social network experts.
7. Significance
The thesis may contribute a part to the development of Internet industry
in Vietnam, which has been emerging recently. As Internet is forecasted to

booming in Vietnam in next few years, companies or individuals can benefit
the result of this study for business.
8. Results
First, the thesis delivers a systematic review of SNS marketing.
Secondly, the thesis studies the case of GoOnline.vn Portal and proposes
solutions to improve it.
9. Thesis structure
Apart from introduction, conclusion and reference parts, this thesis
includes three chapters. Chapter 1 reviews SNS and the use SNS as a
marketing tool and, thereafter, discusses the way to get benefit from SNS.
4
Chapter 2 explores the case of GoOnline.vn, the way they interact with users
and utilize the SNS GoOnline.vn to make money. Chapter 3 proposes some
solutions to improve the SNS GoOnline.vn

Chapter 1:
Theoretical Foundation


Chapter 2:
The case of GoOnline.vn


Chapter 3:
Solutions to improve GoOnline.vn

5
CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL FOUNDATION

1.1 Basic of Social Network Site Marketing

During the past few years, SNS have become a worldwide cultural
phenomenon. The number of SNS has been increasing exponentially.
Technorati, a blog & SNS search site, say that they are now tracking 96.9
million blog & SNS all over the world
4
. In addition, Technorati gives some
conclusion about the number of SNS:
Social network has the basic characteristics. There is a direct
participation of many individuals (or businesses - but act as individual).
Beside, it is an open system the contents of the website was built by the
participants. SNS supports a variety of ways for members to interact. The
minimum features of social networks like profile of members (members must
have a place to share information about yourself, including your avatar, name,
age, gender, place of work) SNS also provides the amount of information,
and the names of the fields depending on the characteristics of each different
Social Networks. When users join in SNS, they have ability to connect
people: the members of the system must be able to make friends with each
other, the system must also support the ability to find new friends in many
different criteria to increase community capacity expansion. One of basic
characteristic of SNS is the interaction between the members: the members of
the system must interact with each other, whether through chat tools, or
offline message, or through the mail And SNS has a place for someone who
can bring something to a content can be articles, emotions, status, or images,


4
Source
6
to the other members in the system can view, comment on content.
1.2 History of Social Network Sites

According to the definition above, the first recognizable social network
site launched in 1997. SixDegrees.com is typical example. It allowed users to
create profiles, list their Friends and, beginning in 1998, surf the Friends lists.
Each of these features existed in some form before SixDegrees. Profiles
existed on most major dating sites and many community sites. AIM and ICQ
buddy lists supported lists of Friends, although those Friends were not visible
to others. Classmates.com allowed people to affiliate with their high school or
college and surf the network for others who were also affiliated, but users
could not create profiles or list Friends until years later. SixDegrees was the
first to combine these features.
―SixDegrees promoted itself as a tool to help people connect with and
send messages to others. While SixDegrees attracted millions of users, it failed
to become a sustainable business and, in 2000, the service closed. Looking back,
its founder believes that SixDegrees was simply ahead of its time‖ (A.
Weinreich, personal communication, July 11, 2007). While people were already
flocking to the Internet, most did not have extended networks of friends who
were online. Early adopters complained that there was little to do after accepting
Friend requests, and most users were not interested in meeting strangers.
The next, ―From 1997 to 2001, a number of community tools began
supporting various combinations of profiles and publicly articulated Friends.
AsianAvenue, BlackPlanet, and MiGente allowed users to create personal,
professional, and dating profiles—users could identify Friends on their
personal profiles without seeking approval for those connections‖ (O. Wasow,
7
personal communication, August 16, 2007). The next wave of SNSs began
when Ryze.com was launched in 2001 to help people leverage their business
networks. Ryze's founder reports that he first introduced the site to his friends—
primarily members of the San Francisco business and technology community,
including the entrepreneurs and investors behind many future SNSs
8

Figure 1.1. Timeline of the launch dates of many major SNS and dates
when community sites re-launched with SNS features

9
1.3 Type of SNS
Social Networking Sites are the sites that host social media.
Forums: Probably one of the first sites to allow for social interaction,
forums have been around for a while. Forums are typically comprised of
people with a similar interest. Users have conversations around a particular
given topic and build up relationships with each other. They provide a great
deal of information about a topic and is a great way to share user’s
knowledge.
SNS: People like to journal, and with the Internet they wanted to share
their lives more openly. Originally called web-logs, these personal journals
have advanced. Some personal journals still exist, while other SNS discuss a
particular niche or interest.
Micro-SNS: Similar to SNS, this is a micro journal of what is
happening right now. These sites can share what is going on in an individual
life or can be information the individual wants to share. Major news events
are now breaking online via microSNS. The best known microSNS is Twitter.
PhotoSharing:Social Networking Sites are known for sharing of
information, in this case photos. Users upload their pictures to Photo Sharing
Sites. Rather than having to send individual pictures to family, user send a
single link. You can tag user’s photos with keywords related to the image and
allow people to comment. Some popular photosharing sites are Flickr and
Picasa.
Video Sharing: Youtube is the video sharing site that almost everyone
has seen. Videos are shared online, keywords are added so people can search
10

for those terms or for the video title. People can comment if the video owner
allows. Like other forms of social media it allows for a more personal look of
the actual user.
Professional: Networking has long been touted as an asset in
professional circles. Networking allows the person to connect with people and
by those connections meet other professionals that person knows. Professional
social media allows for that type of opportunity online. Thus if user move
away from user’s home town user can still remain connected to user’s ex-
coworkers and others in user’s profession. Linked In is one of the top
professional social networking sites.
Social: After user have worked with people a while, they may become
user’s friends. Then user have friends from church, from user’s school, and
friends user have met in a wide variety of ways. Social networking sites are
about being social, so there are sites purely for allowing users to stay in touch
with people whom they know. While MySpace was the leader, the current
leader is Facebook. It is growing around the world.
Bookmarking: The major purpose of these social networking sites is the
sharing of information. If user read a web page that is interesting, informative,
or inspirational user may choose to bookmark it. By doing this user are saying
that user like it. Your friends will learn what user liked and can choose to read
it. Pages that many people bookmark become popular and drive others to that
page as well. Digg, Delicious, and StumpleUpon are very popular
bookmarking websites.
Other formats: There are other types of social networking sites out
there, some are very similar to the ones mentioned here. Many sites have a
11
major form of socializing and then use the other types as a other ways for
users to interact. People love to socialize and interact, so this is a growing
field with ever more sites.
There are other types of social networking sites out there, some are

very similar to the ones mentioned here. Many sites have a major form of
socializing and then use the other types as a other ways for users to interact.
People love to socialize and interact, so this is a growing field with ever
more sites.
According to According to eBizMBA
5
, there are the 15 Most Popular
Social Networking Websitess as derived from our eBizMBA Rank which is
an average of each website's Alexa Global Traffic Rank, and U.S. Traffic
Rank from both Compete and Quantcast. Denotes an estimated Quantcast
rank for websites yet to be Quantified (see Appendix)
1.4 Function of SNS
Most social networking websites are supported by paid advertisements
that appear on member pages. Because of this, most social networking
websites do not carry membership charges and offer free services to all users.
1.4.1 Share
All of SNS focus on this function. Sharing is one of the most important
fuction in one SNS.
Feature: Users can create and customize a profile with certain content
such as name, location, interests, website links, and more.


5
Source
12
Benefit: users can share their story, success, services and products with
the community on their social networking website.
1.4.2 Show
When user sign up one SNS, they want not only show their information
but also their images.

Feature: Users can upload a user’s image to represent on the social
networking website. The other users can view them.
Benefit: The social community can put a face with user’s name, and
come to recognize on user’s user’s avatar.
1.4.3 Socialize
Communication on SNS is one important function. Each SNS has aslo
this one. Through this funcetion, user can talk with the others user (in one
SNS) about what ever they want, what ever they want to talk…
Feature: Communicate with text-based comments. Many social
networks allow user to communicate with friends either by private e-mail-like
correspondence, public message board-like posts, or both.
Benefit: Stay in touch with contacts, reach out to new people, and show
the community which users care about company-to-client communication!
1.4.4 Advertising & Sale
Social networking Web sites, including providing tools that allow
people to share such information with each film and website website interact
online with each other in many ways such as comments, connections, an
13
internal Retweet content, blog or Web page. Currently, the tools on the social
media advertising are known as YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn.
Advertising on Social Media concepts to refer to forms of social media
systems for marketing, online sales, PR or inquiries by customers.
One thing in particular that of social media content titles, customer
group or a group website that is created by people who actually use the
Internet, not the member's direct suppliers. For example, large photos on
Flickr are user uploaded and shared with other users through the website
Flickr, Flickr is not done by staff.
Other companies use forms of advertising on social media is to make
use of social media tools promote their brand,increase visibility of their
website on social media-systems.

For example, companies can create a quality profile on Facebook, fan page
up page, or on Twitter to increase the number of followers, the number Retweet.
1.5 Overview of SNS Marketing from the site master perspective.
First of all, the author would like to introduce about traditional
marketing and poduct positioning process.
In marketing, positioning has come to mean the process by which
marketers try to create an image or identity in the minds of their target market
for its product, brand, or organization.
Generally, the product positioning process involves:
1. Defining the market in which the product or brand will compete (who
the relevant buyers are)
14
2. Identifying the attributes (also called dimensions) that define the
product 'space'
3. Collecting information from a sample of customers about their
perceptions of each product on the relevant attributes
4. Determine each product's share of mind
5. Determine each product's current location in the product space
6. Determine the target market's preferred combination of attributes
Examine the fit between:
o The position of product
o The position of the ideal vector
7. Interest and started a conversation.
There are many definitions about SNS marketing, according to
www.SNSMarketing.com, SNS marketing is a recent component of
organizations integrated marketing communications plans. Integrated
marketing communications is a principle organizations follow to connect with
their targeted markets. Integrated marketing communications coordinates the
elements of the promotional mix—advertising, personal selling, public
relations, publicity, direct marketing, and sales promotion—to produce a

customer focused message. In the traditional marketing communications
model, the content, frequency, timing, and medium of communications by the
organization is in collaboration with an external agent, i.e. advertising
agencies, marketing research firms, and public relations firms. However, the
growth of social media has impacted the way organizations communicate with
their customers. In the emergence of Web 2.0, the Internet provides a set of
tools that allow people to build social and business connections, share
information and collaborate on projects online.
15
Social network marketing programs usually center on efforts to create
content that attracts attention, generates online conversations, and encourages
readers to share it with their social networks. The message spreads from user
to user and presumably resonates because it is coming from a trusted source,
as opposed to the brand or company itself.
Social network has become a platform that is easily accessible to
anyone with Internet access, opening doors for organizations to increase their
brand awareness and facilitate conversations with the customer. Additionally,
social media serves as a relatively inexpensive platform for organizations to
implement marketing campaigns. Organizations can receive direct feedback
from their customers and targeted markets.
1.51 Steps in SNS marketing
1.5.1.1 From User
They are using these sites because they are popular and fun, but they do
not have a clear written plan to help them use social networking effectively.
There are ten steps user can take to change that for user and to make sure that
user do have an effective social networking plan in place.

16
Decide what user’s social networking
goals are




Determine which SNS’s user will use.




Determine where most of user’s target
audience hangs out




Write down user’s social networking
plan




Use a timer when working on user’s
SNS

Print out checklist




Make revisions