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Three Social Media Marketing Trends To Watch In 2020

February 6, 2020 No Comments

By Stephanie Wells.

With the new year here, it’s time for marketers to solidify their strategies for more productive, effective results. The marketing landscape is constantly changing and evolving, and if businesses don’t keep up, they’ll see a drop in conversions and revenue.

For social media, this is especially true. Users continue to interact in different ways and use social platforms to engage with brands they do business with. In 2019, 79% of the U.S. population had a social networking profile.

Imagine a business that doesn’t know the first thing about how to use social media to engage their customers. You may have a large following, but if you don’t utilize your platform, you won’t see positive results.

It’s important to keep up with the upcoming social media marketing trends so you and your team create a strategy that’s effective and fruitful. Here are a few trends to watch in 2020 that you can apply to your social media marketing strategy.

Building Online Communities

What keeps users coming back on social media time and time again? When you get tired of the memes, acquaintances’ life updates and baby photos, what entices people to continue using social platforms in their leisure time?

Social media provides a stable platform of connectivity between people who otherwise wouldn’t coexist as easily. People lead busy lives, and even those you’re close to can become estranged when there’s so much going on. Perhaps a more significant reason people continue using social media is to be part of a bigger community where they feel valued, respected and loved.

In 2020, social media marketers should put more emphasis on building online communities to grow their customer base. There will be more focus on responding to users, cultivating conversations and building authentic brand-consumer relationships. All of these elements will encourage repeat customers and increased engagement.

Humanizing Your Brand

Brands are constantly fighting to grab their audience’s attention and persuade them to look their way. There are so many marketing messages pushed on consumers day in and day out that it takes extra effort to reel them in. How can you intrigue your customers when you have so many competitive forces standing in your way? You humanize your brand.

In the upcoming year, marketers will put more focus on adding human elements to their social marketing messages. There’s no room for robotic, traditional advertising that makes it difficult to produce results. If you want to connect with consumers, then you need to humanize your brand and create relationships beyond your products and services.

Brands are already leveraging the use of memes, slang and pop culture to relate to their customers and build long-lasting customer relationships. I predict this trend will continue to rise in the new year as consumers demand more personalization from the businesses they invest in.

Social Purchasing

Marketers aim to please their customers and provide them with smooth experiences. This includes sharpening website design, improving navigation and offering superior customer support. It also means providing additional convenience wherever possible so businesses have a higher chance of converting customers and generating sales.

That’s why I expect purchasing through social media to continue to grow as a trend for the upcoming year. Companies already bombard users with ad after ad based on their previous searches. Users are used to seeing products they want when they log into social media. More businesses will use this to their advantage by enabling shopping directly through social platforms.

Providing convenience is one of the key ways to drive sales and persuade users to click through. If your brand offers a positive user experience (UX) for customers, you’re sure to see an increase in conversions and engagement.

If you want to boost your social media marketing efforts for the upcoming year, then it’s crucial to pay attention to the trends. You can expect a bigger emphasis on building authentic relationships, social purchasing and humanization to bring audiences and businesses together.

Feature Image Credit: Getty

By Stephanie Wells

Steph is the founder of Formidable Forms, a drag + drop form builder for WordPress that empowers freelancers to create form-based solutions.

Sourced from Forbes

In News

Social Media Tops Digital Advertising With 28% Share: DAN Report

February 4, 2020 No Comments

By Shreya Ganguly.

The total Indian digital advertising industry spending stood at INR 13,683 crore at the end of 2019, a 26 per cent jump from INR 10,859 crore in 2018

Internet penetration in India has undoubtedly given a boost to social media usage and online content consumption. With popular social media platforms reaching out to millions across the country, it serves as an important outlet of advertisement for business and political parties.

According to the recently published, Digital Advertising in India 2020 report by Dentsu Aegis Network (DAN), advertisement spending on digital media in India is led by social media with the highest share of 28 per cent amounting to INR 3,835 crore in the total digital advertising pie.

Social media share is followed by spending on paid search which accounts for 23 per cent, online video accounts for 22 per cent and display media forms 21 per cent.

The report revealed the Indian digital advertising industry spending stood at INR 13,683 crore at the end of 2019. This marks a 26 per cent increase from INR 10,859 crore in 2018. The overall advertising industry grew by 9.4 per cent to become INR 68,475 crore in 2019.

“2020 is going to be cricket heavy; and this, along with the upcoming state and Rajya Sabha Elections, should be able to generate strong demands in advertising. Also, the instant feedback and the ability to track ROI from digital—some of the most distinguishable traits of this medium, will once again make it a favorable platform among advertisers,” said Anand Bhadkamkar, CEO of DAN, in a statement.

Credit: Digital Advertising in India 2020 by DAN

Digital Media Ad Spending To Cross INR 50,000 Crore

According to Bhadkamkar, as the economy starts looking up in 2020, voice and technology will become the biggest driving forces, and together they may provide a huge impetus to the Indian advertising and marketing industry this year.

The report also showed that advertising spending on digital media is expected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 27.42 per cent to become INR 58,550 crore market by the end of 2025. Factors such as technological advancements, improvements in data science and analytics, introduction of policies and regulations, among others, will drive this growth.

Credit: Digital Advertising in India 2020 by DAN

A deeper insight into various industry segments showed that FMCG has the highest expenditure on advertising, i.e. 30 per cent amounting to INR 20,182 crore followed by e-commerce at 10 per cent and automotive segment. The biggest spenders on digital media are BFSI (42 per cent), consumer durables (38 per cent) and e-commerce (37 per cent).

Credit: Digital Advertising in India 2020 by DAN

Feature Image Credit: Shutterstock.com

By Shreya Ganguly

Sourced from Entrepreneur India

In News

Jump-Start Your Social Media Efforts In 2020

January 14, 2020 No Comments

By Christina Hager.

It’s the beginning of the new year, and not only that; it’s 2020, which has a particularly daunting — or awesome — ring to it, depending on how you look at it. At the start of the year, everyone is certain to rally around the traditional resolutions, like eating better, exercising more and going to bed earlier. But it’s also the time when marketing professionals, business leaders, brands and startups decide they need to get serious about their social media efforts.

Unfortunately, in their enthusiasm to get going, far too many people charge ahead without the proper strategy and support, and find themselves either without the return on investment they expected or burned out on their efforts come April.

To keep you from making those mistakes, here is a checklist for how to jump-start your social media efforts this year:

1. Start with your business goals.

What are you looking to accomplish in the first quarter? By year end? In five years?

Don’t think about what you want to accomplish on social media, but for your actual business. I find that too many organizations focus on what they want to get out of their social media, and don’t start by examining their business goals. Without articulating your business goals, you won’t know the proper next steps to take with social media.

2. Define your audience and which channels they use.

One of the biggest mistakes brands and individual thought leaders make when it comes to social media is that they think they need to be everywhere. Wrong! You don’t need to be on every single channel.

Once you’ve defined your audience (if you say your audience is “everyone,” you’re off to a bad start), you can use best practices to learn where, when and how they use social media. Don’t go to the newest channel just because it’s the latest thing — have a strategy on why you need to be there.

3. Develop a social media strategy.

Most people skip over this step, but a warning: It’s the most important part!

After you articulate your business goals and identify your target demographic, it’s time to develop a social media strategy that addresses your goals, utilizes the best channels for your demographic and articulates what you want to accomplish on each channel. Examples might include building brand identity, elevating brand awareness, distributing thought leadership or driving traffic to a website.

4. Learn best practices for each channel.

Besides knowing where your target demographic “lives” and how they use each social media channel, you must understand the best practices for each channel. This means knowing the best times to post, how to optimize a post for a particular channel and how to best use the channels.

For instance, if you are going to use Twitter, a few tweets a week won’t cut it. You will likely need two posts a day at a bare minimum — but optimally, you should aim for 10 or more! You must also use hashtags, engage with your audience and with other accounts, participate in “tweet chats,” and post a variety of content.

5. Create campaigns and build your content.

Develop social media campaigns that align with your goals. Then create pieces of content for your campaigns — and go beyond text. You’ll need photos, videos (which you can film in batches), polls, Instagram stories, etc. You should develop content that addresses your target demographic and is right for the given channel (this is something I’ve written about in a previous piece).

6. Don’t forget about curated content.

So many people get scared about social media because they think they don’t have time to create all the content they need. But don’t forget about curated content! This means content created by people you trust that is valid for your audience and their needs.

This could be YouTube videos, articles, graphics, blog posts, etc. If you are going to share it, just make sure it is relevant for your audience — don’t share it just because it’s the latest meme to go viral.

7. Create well-planned social media campaigns.

Build campaigns based on your social media goals for each channel, and include clear calls to action (CTAs). One channel might have a brand awareness campaign going, while another has a thought leadership campaign. Be deliberate about what each campaign is designed to accomplish.

8. Create a distribution schedule.

You can’t post content whenever you feel like it and hope for the best. The easiest way to keep track of your content and campaigns is by creating a content distribution schedule.

You might use an Excel spreadsheet or create an editorial calendar. Create tabs for all of the pertinent information, such as the asset or content, copy (with hashtags), date and time, channel, and image. Include both your original and curated content on this schedule.

9. Choose an execution point person.

You might utilize someone in your office, an agency or a freelancer. You can also save money by finding a savvy social media user, such as a marketing student, who will follow your content distribution calendar and post it all for you.

If you are using social media for extended customer service (which many clients expect), you will need a point person monitoring your channels and a plan for what to do when there is customer interaction on the channels.

10. Don’t forget about metrics!

All of your social media efforts can be measured. Your initial strategy should clearly define what can be measured. Decide when you are going to take those measurements, who is going to do it and which metrics are important to you.

This doesn’t just mean counting “likes.” Focus on engagement metrics like shares and comments, as well as responses to your CTA, such as a click to a website. All of this can and should be tracked for each campaign and each channel.

With these strategies firmly in mind, you’ll head into the new year on your social media A-game!

Feature Image Credit: Getty

By Christina Hager

As Head of Social Media Strategy at Overflow, I help transform individuals and brands into industry leaders.

Sourced from Forbes

In News

The Most Captivating Brand Campaigns We Saw on Social Media in 2019

January 9, 2020 No Comments

By Mónica Marie Zorrilla

Unmetric analyzes dogs, K-pop and Colonel Sanders as engagement perfection

For the past decade, brands have been capitalizing on the pervasiveness of social media in consumers’ daily lives and shopping habits. And this past year was no different.

Social media analytics company Unmetric found that brands that promoted messaging with edge, savvy, conviction—and occasionally dogs—won the marketing game.

Of that messaging, video—particularly those with memorable storylines, guest appearances or creative approaches to addressing social issues—reined as the overall best-performing format for branded and original content, a consistent trend in their numbers since at least 2015.

Lux Narayan, CEO of Unmetric (now a Falcon.io/Cision company), observed that the majority of Facebook and Instagram’s top advertising posts this year were videos. However, the majority of brand posts on Twitter with the most engagement in 2019 were posts accompanied by images that involved controversy, humor and one-liners, riffing on trending topics or roasting celebrity personas and political figures.

Brands that were quick to troll kept their follow-up memes relevant while also retaining and promoting their core identity for plenty of retweets, like this SparkNotes tweet from July:

Per Unmetric, retweets on the platform are a far more valuable metric for brands than favorites.

To determine levels of engagement, Unmetric analyzes brand posts on a month-by-month basis across social platforms and scores them between zero and 1,000 based on variables such as the number of shares. For YouTube, there is no engagement score, but likes, views and comments are important. Unmetric’s own algorithms and human insights also figure into the ranking and paid, not organic, reach is measured.

Narayan pointed out that certain types of campaigns performed better than others in 2019, listing the most popular categories as social responsibility, satire, anything with animals, music industry partnerships and holidays and observances.

Here’s a breakdown by category of some of the social posts that Unmetric designated a perfect score of 1,000:

Social responsibility

Gillette’s “The Best a Man Can Be” campaign featured a 90-second spot created by AOR Grey New York this past January. Director Kim Gehrig beckons viewers to redefine masculinity and reconsider the age-old “boys will be boys” excuse. This #MeToo era twist on Gillette’s 30-year-old “The Best a Man Can Get” garnered thousands of retweets and YouTube views, making it one of the most engaging brand posts at the start of 2019.

Another top performer in this category was similar to the Gillette ad. Nike’s “Dream Crazier” spot, also directed by Gehrig, was also created to celebrate a 30-year-old slogan (“Just do it”) while focusing on the subject of gender. Narrated by Serena Williams, the 90-second spot acknowledges the double-standard female athletes are subjected to whenever they show emotion and are labeled as “crazy” instead of ambitious or passionate. Per Unmetric’s research, the ad was one of the most engaging brand posts on Instagram in February.

Click HERE to read the remainder of the article.

Feature Image Credit: Ray-Ban’s #ProudToBelong is a campaign ran across most of its social networks throughout 2019. It was one of the most popular YouTube ads this year. Ray Ban

By Mónica Marie Zorrilla

Sourced from ADWEEK 40

In News

How Do You Identify your Target Audience in Social Media

December 19, 2019 No Comments

Sourced from Right Mix Marketing

Without knowing how to properly identify your target market, it will be difficult for you to make a perfect pitch that will convert your audience into customers. Most businesses fail on this part as they tend to reach out to anyone interested in their services.

The problem with this targeting approach is it appeals to a broad audience. Doing this will give your services a hard time to stand out from the growing competition online.

To avoid wasting your marketing efforts, you need to narrow down your niche. Your business will increase its tendency to generate leads and sales if you place it in a specific market. No business can target everyone.

To get you started, here’s a handful of tips on defining your target audience.

1. Who are your ideal customers?

The initial step in developing your social media marketing strategies is to know the interests and characteristics of your audience. This information is vital in understanding your buyer personas. Know the reasons why they like your services or products and what drives them to trust your business.

Surveys are a helpful tool to ask your customers about their preference and how they want their problems to be solved. This will give you an insight into how you will communicate and interact with them.

2. Check out the competition

If you are new to the business and just starting out, it is obviously hard to squeeze in the tight competition. But it does not mean that you don’t stand a chance. Do not compete with the giants. They have been there for a reason. They have worked hard for years to establish their online reputation.

Study the audience they are targeting including their current customers. Look out for the potential market that they might overlook and take advantage of it. Instead of competing in the same market, focus on the niche market and build your solid foundation there.

3. Conduct a Product/Service Analysis

No matter how good your marketing strategies are, your business will not grow if you have the wrong product or service. This is the reason why your company exists. Remember that it is not about only the products and services you are offering but the benefits that they provide.

Do not too much of the product. Instead, highlight their important features and how they can solve people’s problems and needs. For example, you are offering web design services. The benefit is you will be giving businesses professional brand identity. This unique identity will make them stand out, increase exposure, and attract more customers.

After you listed all the benefits, identify the people that will be needing them. For example, you may target start-up businesses interested in creating an impressive company image. From there, you will narrow it down. What niche? House cleaning? Interior design start-ups? You have a choice.

4. Target Specific Demographics

The closer you are to the target, the higher the chances that you will hit them. You do not want to launch your marketing campaign and hope someone would buy your product and avail to your service.

Consider these essential factors:

Age – Are you targeting teens, adults, stay-at-home moms, etc.? Make sure that your approach is suitable to the age of your target audience so that they can easily relate.

Location – Are you going local or national? Where are your customers located? What is the community looks like?

Gender – If your business is selling make-up and beauty products, you’re probably targeting women.

Income level – Look at the price of your product or service. Is it affordable? It’s hard to market an expensive product especially if your customers belong to a low or middle-income class. Put yourself on their shoes.

5. Identify the behavior of your target audience

In addition to demographics, you should also determine the psychographics. Does it fit their interests? For example, you don’t want to sell solar panels in the area that has a typically cold climate. Your products should appeal to your customer’s personality, values, and lifestyle.

Once they find out that your products and services provide significance to their daily lives, they would likely go after it.

6. Determine the platforms Your Audience are commonly using

Not all social media platforms work the same. They have different strengths and weaknesses. By understanding the online behavior of your audience, you will know what channel you will utilize. Most demographics are using Facebook while is Instagram is a great platform which makes use of photos to promote businesses. Twitter is a good channel to get to know of the latest news and trends and LinkedIn is the best platform to reach out to industry leaders and professionals.

7. Tailor your Content

Observe what your competitors are doing and have an idea why they are successful. What are the methods they are using to drive engagement? What other areas do they lack? Will you be able to exploit their shortcomings?

If you’re on the budget, you can use SMM services from digital marketing agencies like Search Media. When promoting content in social media, do not focus on self-promotion. Share relevant content from trusted sources and industry experts to develop trust and credibility.

Spend time on social media to understand audience behavior such as when is the time there are most active users. This information will help you learn when is the best time to post and share your content.

Not only that, social media is not all about posting! Reach more people by encouraging interaction and communication. Build an active community where people can constantly see and hear from you.

8. Be a problem-solver

Make people feel that you are not just a business but a human too who can understand their feelings and interests. Research their pain points and base your marketing on solving those problems. By giving your brand a voice, you can create more influence, attract more followers, and build more opportunity to connect with your customers.

Sourced from Right Mix Marketing

Right Mix Marketing focuses on digital marketing, technology, eCommerce, entrepreneurship and business related content. Want to become a contributor at RMM? Email us on rightmixmarketing [at] gmail [dot] com !

In News

How To Create A Marketing Plan For Social Networking

December 5, 2019 No Comments

By Mitrovman Mitrovski

Need to Build a Marketing Plan for Social Networking? That’s not an easy task. Many of us have difficulties in understanding what it is. Let alone making one from scratch.

Simply put, every action you take on social media should be part of a broader marketing strategy. This means that every post, response, like, or comment should be guided by a plan directly geared toward achieving business goals. That may sound complicated, but if you take the time to build a comprehensive social networking strategy, the rest will come naturally. Anyone can do this if they properly approach that matter.

What is a social media marketing plan?

It summarizes everything you plan and hopes to accomplish in your business by using social networks. The plan should include checking your orders, where you want them, and what tools you will use to achieve this. In general, the more accurate you are in creating a plan, the more effective you’ll be in implementing it. Try to be concise. Do not make a plan that’s so broad or demanding that it is virtually unattainable. The plan will guide your actions, but it will also be a measure to determine whether or not you are moving towards success.

You can follow this simple plan to create your strategy.

1. Create your social network goals

The first step in any strategy on social networks is to set the business goals. When you define goals, that allows you to react quickly. Especially if the campaign you are running doesn’t meet your expectations. Without goals, you don’t even have the means to measure success or proof of return on investment (ROI). The goals should be aligned with your broad marketing strategy. That way, the efforts you make on social networks go directly to the realization of your business ideas. If your social media strategy is proven to support your business goals, you are more likely to pay back and make new investments. Go beyond benchmarks such as likes or retweets. Focus on advanced metrics like leads, conversion rates, and web referrals. It would be a good idea to keep track of your goals by using the SMART backbone. This means Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound.

2. Check your social networks

Before creating a marketing plan for social networks, you should evaluate their current benefits and the way you use them. Therefore, using Content, Strategy & Branding literature is a fantastic read.

This means you need to find out who you are connected to, then what social networks your target audience is mostly using, and what your social media presence is like compared to your competition.

3. Create or improve your accounts

When you’re done checking your accounts, it’s time to refine your online presence. Choose the one that best fits your business goals. If you still don’t have an online profile that you should focus on the most, create one having a wider audience and goals in mind. If you have one, maybe it’s time to update and improve it. This will give you the best possible results at the end. Remember that every social network has a unique audience. Therefore, each of them should be treated differently.

Profile optimization helps you generate more web traffic to your online business. Cross-promotion of accounts on social networks can increase the reach of a post. Profiles should be completely populated, and images and text should be optimized for the particular network.

4. Create a content plan and an announcements calendar

Good content is certainly essential for success on social networks. Your social media marketing plan should also include a content marketing plan, consisting of content creation strategies and the announcements calendar. Your social network content plan should answer some of these questions:

What kind of content are you going to post online?
How often will you post content?
What is the target group for each content type?
Who will create the content?
How will you promote the content?

Your announcement calendar will include the dates and times when you intend to post on Facebook, Instagram, Tweeter, etc. Create a calendar and schedule announcements, so you don’t have to do it every day.

5. Test and analyze your marketing plan

To find out what adjustments you need to make in your marketing strategy better, you must constantly test it. Use every opportunity to test the actions you take on social networks. Analyze both successful and unsuccessful campaigns. That way, you can tailor your marketing strategy to your goals. Research is also a great way to measure success. Ask your followers for their opinion on your work. This kind of direct approach can sometimes be extremely effective.

Feature Image Credit: villagebriefing.com

By Mitrovman Mitrovski

Sourced from Chart Attack

In News

Ex-Facebook head says company ‘profits partly by amplifying lies’

December 3, 2019 No Comments

By Matt Binder.

Facebook’s former head of Global Elections Integrity Ops left after six months on the job — and now she’s speaking out about the problems she faced when trying to fix the company’s political ad problems.

In an op-ed in the Washington Post on Monday, Yaël Eisenstat, who joined Facebook after working with the CIA and the White House, says she tried to sound the alarm at the company leading up to the 2016 election. Recently, Facebook said it would let politicians lie in ads in the name of “free expression.”

“I didn’t think I was going to change the company,” wrote Eisenstat. “But I wanted to help Facebook think through the very challenging questions of what role it plays in politics, in the United States and around the world, and the best way to ensure that it is not harming democracy.”

Eisenstat explained that while employed at Facebook, she saw firsthand how ad tools and features were misunderstood by users and how the company pushed back on any suggested moves to fix the problem.

She said that she believes that when the company approves political advertisers, and provides them with a checkmark and a “paid for” label, it adds credibility to the posts. In reality, Facebook and its partners don’t fact-check any of this content.

“The real problem is that Facebook profits partly by amplifying lies and selling dangerous targeting tools…” “The real problem is that Facebook profits partly by amplifying lies and selling dangerous targeting tools that allow political operatives to engage in a new level of information warfare. Its business model exploits our data to let advertisers custom-target people, show us each a different version of the truth and manipulate us with hyper-customized ads — ads that, as of two weeks ago, can contain blatantly false and debunked information if they’re run by a political campaign,” she continued. “As long as Facebook prioritizes profit over healthy discourse, they can’t avoid damaging democracies.”

According to Eisenstat, many of her Facebook colleagues agreed with her push to fix some of these political advertising issues. They still do, according to a recent letter signed by hundreds of Facebook employees.

Facebook’s leadership, however, did not agree.

“Ultimately, I was not empowered to do the job I was hired to do, and I left within six months,” she says.

In addition to sharing her own experience at the company, Eisenstat makes the case as to why Facebook’s ad transparency tools don’t cut it.

“True transparency would include information about the tools that differentiate advertising on Facebook from traditional print and television, and in fact make it more dangerous: Can I see if a political advertiser used the custom audience tool, and if so, if my email address was uploaded? Can I see what look-alike audience advertisers are seeking? Can I see a true, verified name of the advertiser in the disclaimer? Can I see if and how your algorithms amplified the ad?” she writes. “If not, the claim that Facebook is simply providing a level playing field for free expression is a myth.”

Eisenstat doesn’t believe in an outright ban on political advertising, as companies like Twitter have instituted. However, she believes the time for the government to step in and regulate the social media platform is well overdue.

Feature Image Credit:Facebook’s former head of Global Elections Integrity Ops is speaking out about her time at the company. Image: chesnot / Getty Images

By Matt Binder

Sourced from Mashable

In News

Twitter promises ad product improvements as ‘seasonality’ and IT bugs hamper Q3 revenues

November 15, 2019 No Comments

By Katie Deighton

Twitter execs have outlined how they plan to bolster its ad business after missing Q3 revenue targets. It blamed the weak growth on bugs affecting its mobile product, which further hindered ad sales already weakened by the “seasonality” of a slow summer.

Revenues for Q3 were up 9% year-on-year to $824m. The US reported a rise of 10% to $465m, while international growth was slower at 7%, totalling $358m.

Sales fell short of the expected $874m. Growth slowed substantially since Q3 2018, when sales grew 32% year-on-year.

The results, which sent shared in the tech firm tumbling 20%, were explained by advertising “headwinds” driven predominantly by bugs in the company’s targeting system. In a letter to shareholders, Twitter explained the issue had affected its ability to target ads and share data with its measurement and ad partners.

The bugs reduced year-over-year revenue growth by at least 3% in Q3, Twitter wrote in a letter to shareholders.

Ned Segal, Twitter’s chief financial officer, explained the glitches in the legacy mobile application promotion (MAP) product meant information regarding users’ device settings was shared with Twitter for targeting purposes, even if they had asked it not to be.

“When we discovered that … we turned off the setting,” he said on an earnings call this morning (24 October). “That has a negative impact on revenue because it’s one less input you’ve got when you’re figuring out what ads to show people.”

Additionally, a bug meant Twitter was passing on data to measurement companies from users who explicitly asked not to be monitored in such a fashion.

“We stopped doing that, and although we are working on remediation, there isn’t remediation yet in place,” said Segal. “So, the effects of that will continue into Q4.”

Twitter recently faced criticism after it reported some users’ private email addresses and phone numbers had been exposed to its advertisers in a breach of its targeting system.

Aside from the technical issues, organic advertiser interest in Twitter dropped in the quarter, too. “Greater-than-expected” seasonality issues began in July and continued into August, due to what the company dubbed a “relatively lighter slate of big events” taking place when compared to the same period in 2018.

The sales slowdown occurred as Twitter continued to push its offer to advertisers on its global ‘#StartWithThem’ roadshow. The platform has a goal to double its ad business by 2020 and become advertisers’ most recommended partner.

Today, Segal outlined the company’s immediate and long term plans to bring more advertiser dollars into the business and appease Wall Street qualms.

He first stated the company will continue to actively market its platform to big advertisers. By way of example, he observed that while 38 of this year’s Super Bowl advertisers were on the social network at the same time as the game, there were eight “to whom we still need to make the case”.

“[We’re also] continuing to improve relevance, to continue to come out with better ad formats and improve versions of our existing ad formats,” he said.

He added Twitter could do a better job in monetizing smaller advertisers – an area it has not “prioritized” in the past.

“We’ve got to do the engineering work and make the case to them better than we are today, and right now we’re chosen to prioritize other things first,” he said.

Finally, he noted the Twitter ads experience could also be improved through better educating clients and working more closely with advertisers on their paid-for content.

“There’s also opportunity without selling one more ad to put better copy in the ads that exist today,” he said. “And we still have half of our video ads being served at longer than 15 seconds. As you can imagine on a service like Twitter, the completion rates for video ads that are six seconds are much better.

“That, along with continuing to improve relevance, better formats and moving down the funnel in terms of the types of advertising that’s available … are all things that ought to help us.”

Feature Image Credit: Twitter launched a consumer campaign in recent months / Jonathan Hokklo

By Katie Deighton

Sourced from The Drum

In News

How to Tell Your Story (and Build a Brand) Through Social Media

November 12, 2019 No Comments

By Jillian Kramer.

Before you post, ask yourself three essential questions.

Social media isn’t just a way to pass idle time (or to find inspiration for your next decorating project). It’s a valuable tool to tell your business’ story and build your brand. As Reena Goodwin, founder and director of Facteur PR, explains, social media gives business owners a direct line to current and potential customers. “By creating and sharing high-quality content and stories, social media opens a door to share a brand’s story on a deeper and more direct level,” Goodwin says. “When a brand shares its story on social media, that story helps build trust. And because a brand’s reputation is ultimately built on trust, it’s an important medium for any brand to harness.”

Alexander Spatari / Getty Images

What’s more, social media can be a free and useful resource for your business. “Its affordability is attractive to business owners,” says Goodwin. “The cost to launch a Facebook, Pinterest, or Instagram account is free, and your reach is dependent on the amount of resources you pour into it. Furthermore, the rich audience data is so helpful for businesses. By analyzing your followers’ behaviors, demographics, and interests, coupled with utilizing the various built-in survey tools, you can start to use the data to drill down audience personas, which can be very helpful when it comes to targeting your ideal client or customer as well as serving the ones you currently have.”

Here’s how to harness the power of social media to tell your story as well as build your brand.

Have a plan.

Goodwin advises against posting without a plan in place. A social media plan “makes sure that we are supporting the vision of our brand and helps manage expectations and resources,” says Goodwin. “It also ensures that we maximize our time strategizing upfront so we can devote our energies to executing our plan thereafter. A lot of social media management is spent reacting; with a plan in place in advance, we can be sure to allocate time and energy to the things that will ultimately help build our brand,” such as developing incentive opportunities and filming videos.

Before they post to social media, Natalie Denyse, owner of In Good Company PR, tells clients to ask themselves: “Why does this post matter to my audience? Does this photo show more than just a pretty scene? And, how is this post, both photo and caption, serving my community?” she says. “Feeling confident in those few areas will help crystalize the intention behind your voice.”

Respond to feedback.

Comments and messages left on your social media are opportunities to build your brand’s reputation, says Kathleen Reidenbach, chief commercial officer of Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants. When you respond in real-time—or as quickly as possible—shows excellent customer service, and gives you unique opportunities to interact with potential and current customers, Reidenbach explains.

For example, when Reidenbach found out through social media that a bride staying at a Kimpton Hotel property for her honeymoon had been stood up at her wedding, “the hotel quickly switched her room around to be more of a ‘we’re really sorry,’ party with chocolate, wine, and comfort food. It made her smile and she [told us] it made such an awful situation that much better and said she had an amazing solo honeymoon with us. That’s something that felt right to the hotel team and they acted in the moment, making for an incredible save-the-day story.”

Share high-quality content.

“Thanks to the instantaneous nature of social media, it’s widely believed that we must be posting content constantly,” says Goodwin. But that’s not strictly true. “By sacrificing the quality of content for the sake of speed, you could also be sacrificing the first impression your brand has on a potential customer,” she warns. High-quality content tells a better brand story, even if it means you post less often. “High-quality content is associated with a high-quality product or service,” Goodwin points out, “so it’s important to invest in content creation like professional photoshoots. I love batch-creating content to save time and money. You can hire a photographer on a quarterly basis to take updated photos for social media, or invest in a nice camera and snap your own.”

Show up on Stories.

Did you know that engagement on Instagram Stories is higher than on its newsfeed? It is—and that’s one reason why it’s essential to post regularly on Stories. “Stories is ideal for building your brand because in contrast to content on the newsfeed, it’s a space for less polished and more down-to-earth storytelling,” Goodwin explains. In fact, Denyse recommends to her clients that build their brands by showing the imperfect reality of being in business. “Real and raw video footage of brands actually building their business will continue to trump perfectly styled photos,” she says. “Don’t be afraid to get candid and show authentic moments of your creative process.

By Jillian Kramer

Sourced from martha steward

In News

Semantic content analysis will disrupt marketing – for the better

November 4, 2019 No Comments

By Jergan Callebaut

We know that exceptional content is what makes a brand. We also know that analysing our data to very specifically target audiences is crucial for great ROI. But we rarely put the two together and use the data available to actually analyse what content works – and why.

Yet knowing exactly why content works can give us that winning edge. And, luckily, the ability to see what indisputably resonates the most with our audience – and drives our bottom-line – is already in our hands.

The state of play

In the climate of the current ‘data boom’, audience targeting naturally takes precedence, with the majority (55%) of marketers saying ‘better use of data’ for audience targeting is their priority in 2019, according to Econsultancy.

It makes sense. On a daily basis, we’re faced with countless blogs, podcasts, speakers and everything in-between promising that if we perfectly optimise our targeting, our messaging will beat the daunting odds of the 0.9% CTR cited by WordStream. And so, we dedicate hours and hours every week to creating personas, hypothesising about audiences, segmenting users and running lengthy A/B tests to find the piece of content that our audience love. We add to our already-complex marketing stacks tools that tell us what messaging has been more successful, in order for us to optimise.

But when we do find that winner, do we know why it works? Do we know exactly what features caused the higher CTR? Do we know how we’re going to recreate it in our next campaign, to make it better, even?

This lack of knowledge – despite all the tools and techniques we use to offer insight – is what we at Datasine call the ‘black box’ because when it comes to understanding why, we are left in the dark. Just looking at results doesn’t give us the insight needed to truly understand content preferences in an actionable way.

Semantic content analysis

To crack open the black box, we need to start conducting in-depth semantic analysis of our content. Only then can we begin to truly understand why some content resonates and some doesn’t.

As experienced marketers, we come prepackaged with a deep understanding of – and fascination with – psychology and our audience, meaning we’ve already got the skills on paper to analyse our content. It’s simply a matter of breaking it down into parts. We’ll look at this in terms of images and text.

If you want to analyse your imagery, you can take all the image assets you’ve ever created and note down the particular elements you used in each, then check to see if there are any patterns which relate those choices to your ad performance.

For example:

Did you use a photo of your product outdoors? Or in the showroom?
Were people visible in the shot?
What was the size of the text, and the colour of any overlays or CTAs?

It may even be worth inviting a panel to judge your images on the emotions that they evoke, or photographers to assess the quality and composition of the shot.

You can do the same for text content, approaching this by categorising how you describe your product or service. For example:

Do you appeal to your product’s ease of use?
Are you emphasising your innovative credentials?
Do you use particularly casual – or formal – language?

With this process, we can see which types of content are receiving the most engagement. And we can use these features to keep creating great campaigns that we further optimise as our understanding of customer content preferences grows.

Scaling content analysis

If we have just a few campaigns on the go, content analysis is easier, but it gets harder as we scale. It stops being practical to expect humans to spend days, weeks, even months labelling what goes into each piece of content. Here’s where machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) come to the rescue.

AI models can extract all of these elements in seconds by analysing image or text semantically to look at content like humans do. That way, we can cut back on lengthy, expensive A/B testing, and get rid of guesswork once and for all – a vision we at Datasine are working toward. Our AI platform Connect (formerly Pomegranate) automatically identifies the most effective content for your audience.

By embracing semantic content analysis and working collaboratively with AI, we can feel confident in understanding exactly what content is going to work before we hit send.