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In News

Up Your Social Media Game By Answering These 8 Branding Questions

August 13, 2018 No Comments

Don’t put the social media cart before the brand strategy horse.

To excel at social media, you must be a social media expert, right? While this is true in some respects, having narrow social media knowledge can also be limiting. A social media-only focus can actually hold back your social media strategy from reaching its full potential. You are building more than a social media presence — you are building a brand. Social media is not an end unto itself. Vanity metrics — followers and likes — may be early indicators of good content, but the true test of social media is business impact. Management will eventually stop paying for social media activity that doesn’t lead to bottom line action.

Despite the hype, spending on social media has failed to live up to expectations. In 2017, actual social media spending was nearly half of predicted levels. This stems from a continued struggle to show the real impact of social media and to integrate social media with wider marketing strategy. CMO Survey results indicate marketers still rank social media low in its contribution to company performance (46 percent) and low in how well it is integrated with the wider marketing strategy (59 percent). Social media actions, and even plans can exist on their own, but without having an understanding of the larger marketing and business strategy behind them, they could be acting in vain. Are you putting the social media cart before the brand strategy horse?

To help understand how social media fits into the bigger picture of marketing and business, consider the following key questions to help develop a basic brand understanding of your business or organization. The questions emphasize the consumer perspective which is especially important in social media. Answering these questions can help create a broader understanding of a business, its marketing and how social media contributes. They can help you gain more of a branding perspective, speak the language of business and move towards integration and improving ROI.

1. Why does the business exist?

Vision and mission matter to today’s consumers. To make money is not a sustainable answer for customers or employees. What does the company behind the product or service stand for, and where is it headed? This could be a focus on solving a greater problem or spreading a bigger message. Maybe the business supports a cause, community or the environment. Perhaps the mission is simply being the absolute best at something specific.

2. How did the business get started?

A brand’s backstory is important. People buy for rational and emotional reasons that can come from an organization’s origin story. Show the human side of the business starting in a garage, the founders investing their last five dollars or making a childhood dream come true. Perhaps an event put the cause on their heart, or something they couldn’t get as a customer motivated the creation of the company. Even large corporations can benefit by showcasing their humble roots.

3. How does the business measure success?

Business objectives are where the rubber meets the road. All marketing action, including social media, must help support business needs such as sales, average spend, market share, leads, contracts, awareness, customer satisfaction, retention, referrals, volunteer, or donations. To do this, brand building must start with specific objectives clearly defined. Make sure they are SMART:

Specific (quantified such as XX percent or $XX)
Measurable (data you can access)
Achievable (not too high)
Relevant (support vision/mission)
Timely (deadline like X months or X years)

4. What does the business sell?

Don’t take knowledge of the brand’s products and services for granted. Start by literally listing every product and service offering, lines and versions. But then go further to describe each from the consumer’s perspective. What is the real value to the customer? Turn product and service features into consumer benefits. Then look for gaps in product lines and offerings from the company, but also its competitors. This can uncover key messages to emphasize and may uncover key opportunities for growth.

5. What is happening in the industry?

An industry overview provides valuable context. Is the industry and category growing or declining? What innovations and trends are important? Are there gaps in offerings? What do consumers care about most? What are their pain points, threats and opportunities? What are the consumer’s unmet needs? Once identified, clearly communicate how the brand meets these needs.

6. Who is the business trying to reach?

Be clear on the overall market and ensure you have the right target market. Don’t merely identify everyone who could possibly use the product or service. Focus limited resources on the segment with greatest possibility of return. Narrowly define the group most likely to have the unmet needs the business provides. Be specific with demographic (gender, age, income, education), psychographic (attitudes, values, lifestyle) and behavioral (products used, brand loyalty, usage) bases. Who needs the solutions the brand offers the most?

7. Who else targets this market?

Brands are evaluated by consumers against key competitors. Identify several top competitors by market share and sales in same industry and/or by replacement products and services outside the category. What do you offer that is different? Why should they pick you? With this understanding summarize the main distinctions of the brand.

8. How can you sum up your branding strategy?

Understanding your main message focuses effort, ensures consistency and improves integration. Summarize all the answers above into a positioning statement written to the target market. Boil it all down to a main overall message. What is the essence of what the brand means to the target audience?

Now that you have a larger brand understanding, take that knowledge and apply it to current social media presence and actions. Where is the target market active in social media? Look at social networks, messaging apps, blogs/forums, ratings/reviews and podcasts. Look for ways to leverage geosocial, crowdsourcing, influencer marketing, social care, user generated content and paid social media. Identify the top social platforms for the target and then compare to the current business social media accounts. Do you need to make some adjustments based on the target market?

What about messages and content? Are you talking about the right things based on your products and services, industry and competitors? Look at business objectives. Are you driving to the right places and actions that matter? Are you telling the complete brand story? Don’t miss out on parts of the mission, vision and backstory that could drive consumer action. Finally, ensure that all social media is integrated in message, tone and look with other forms of digital and traditional marketing communication to optimize efforts. It could be a good time to perform a social media audit.

Being a better social media professional can start with improving your business intelligence and gaining a better understanding of overall branding. Having a strong foundation in branding will lead your social media activities in the right business building direction. The latest CMO Survey results indicate that the top use of social media by companies is for brand awareness and brand building. Answering these questions will increase your brand knowledge and help improve your social media strategy.

Feature Image Credit: Kelvin Murray | Getty Images

By Keith Quesenberry

Associate professor Messiah College, social & digital marketing expert

Sourced from Entrepreneur Europe

In News

Up Your Social Media Game By Answering These 8 Branding Questions

July 31, 2018 No Comments

By Keith Quesenberry

Don’t put the social media cart before the brand strategy horse.

To excel at social media, you must be a social media expert, right? While this is true in some respects, having narrow social media knowledge can also be limiting. A social media-only focus can actually hold back your social media strategy from reaching its full potential. You are building more than a social media presence — you are building a brand. Social media is not an end unto itself. Vanity metrics — followers and likes — may be early indicators of good content, but the true test of social media is business impact. Management will eventually stop paying for social media activity that doesn’t lead to bottom line action.

Despite the hype, spending on social media has failed to live up to expectations. In 2017, actual social media spending was nearly half of predicted levels. This stems from a continued struggle to show the real impact of social media and to integrate social media with wider marketing strategy. CMO Survey results indicate marketers still rank social media low in its contribution to company performance (46 percent) and low in how well it is integrated with the wider marketing strategy (59 percent). Social media actions, and even plans can exist on their own, but without having an understanding of the larger marketing and business strategy behind them, they could be acting in vain. Are you putting the social media cart before the brand strategy horse?

To help understand how social media fits into the bigger picture of marketing and business, consider the following key questions to help develop a basic brand understanding of your business or organization. The questions emphasize the consumer perspective which is especially important in social media. Answering these questions can help create a broader understanding of a business, its marketing and how social media contributes. They can help you gain more of a branding perspective, speak the language of business and move towards integration and improving ROI.

1. Why does the business exist?

Vision and mission matter to today’s consumers. To make money is not a sustainable answer for customers or employees. What does the company behind the product or service stand for, and where is it headed? This could be a focus on solving a greater problem or spreading a bigger message. Maybe the business supports a cause, community or the environment. Perhaps the mission is simply being the absolute best at something specific.

2. How did the business get started?

A brand’s backstory is important. People buy for rational and emotional reasons that can come from an organization’s origin story. Show the human side of the business starting in a garage, the founders investing their last five dollars or making a childhood dream come true. Perhaps an event put the cause on their heart, or something they couldn’t get as a customer motivated the creation of the company. Even large corporations can benefit by showcasing their humble roots.

3. How does the business measure success?

Business objectives are where the rubber meets the road. All marketing action, including social media, must help support business needs such as sales, average spend, market share, leads, contracts, awareness, customer satisfaction, retention, referrals, volunteer, or donations. To do this, brand building must start with specific objectives clearly defined. Make sure they are SMART:

Specific (quantified such as XX percent or $XX)
Measurable (data you can access)
Achievable (not too high)
Relevant (support vision/mission)
Timely (deadline like X months or X years)

4. What does the business sell?

Don’t take knowledge of the brand’s products and services for granted. Start by literally listing every product and service offering, lines and versions. But then go further to describe each from the consumer’s perspective. What is the real value to the customer? Turn product and service features into consumer benefits. Then look for gaps in product lines and offerings from the company, but also its competitors. This can uncover key messages to emphasize and may uncover key opportunities for growth.

5. What is happening in the industry?

An industry overview provides valuable context. Is the industry and category growing or declining? What innovations and trends are important? Are there gaps in offerings? What do consumers care about most? What are their pain points, threats and opportunities? What are the consumer’s unmet needs? Once identified, clearly communicate how the brand meets these needs.

6. Who is the business trying to reach?

Be clear on the overall market and ensure you have the right target market. Don’t merely identify everyone who could possibly use the product or service. Focus limited resources on the segment with greatest possibility of return. Narrowly define the group most likely to have the unmet needs the business provides. Be specific with demographic (gender, age, income, education), psychographic (attitudes, values, lifestyle) and behavioral (products used, brand loyalty, usage) bases. Who needs the solutions the brand offers the most?

7. Who else targets this market?

Brands are evaluated by consumers against key competitors. Identify several top competitors by market share and sales in same industry and/or by replacement products and services outside the category. What do you offer that is different? Why should they pick you? With this understanding summarize the main distinctions of the brand.

8. How can you sum up your branding strategy?

Understanding your main message focuses effort, ensures consistency and improves integration. Summarize all the answers above into a positioning statement written to the target market. Boil it all down to a main overall message. What is the essence of what the brand means to the target audience?

Now that you have a larger brand understanding, take that knowledge and apply it to current social media presence and actions. Where is the target market active in social media? Look at social networks, messaging apps, blogs/forums, ratings/reviews and podcasts. Look for ways to leverage geosocial, crowdsourcing, influencer marketing, social care, user generated content and paid social media. Identify the top social platforms for the target and then compare to the current business social media accounts. Do you need to make some adjustments based on the target market?

What about messages and content? Are you talking about the right things based on your products and services, industry and competitors? Look at business objectives. Are you driving to the right places and actions that matter? Are you telling the complete brand story? Don’t miss out on parts of the mission, vision and backstory that could drive consumer action. Finally, ensure that all social media is integrated in message, tone and look with other forms of digital and traditional marketing communication to optimize efforts. It could be a good time to perform a social media audit.

Being a better social media professional can start with improving your business intelligence and gaining a better understanding of overall branding. Having a strong foundation in branding will lead your social media activities in the right business building direction. The latest CMO Survey results indicate that the top use of social media by companies is for brand awareness and brand building. Answering these questions will increase your brand knowledge and help improve your social media strategy.

By Keith Quesenberry

Sourced from Entrepreneur Europe

In News

Winning the social media marketing game

July 27, 2018 No Comments

By Peter Minnium

Contributor Peter Minium explains how connections are formed on social media, the purpose of these connections and how they can be leveraged to win the social media marketing game.

Thousands of years ago, clans gathered around fires to share their day’s experiences and to tell stories that established group norms and shaped social organization. Today, the fire’s embers have been replaced by the glow of internet-connected devices, but the communal exchange of stories and perspectives remains a fundamental force in social development.

From a business standpoint, a few important differences emerge from this evolution. Social media users can now publicly discuss their experiences with brands or products, forming large coalitions of interest that exert vast social pressure on brands and other organizations. From the presidential election to the newest cereal, everything is now a matter of public interest.

The essential principle, however, of shaping our world by sharing stories remains the same. The connections we build with others around us are the infrastructure of social change. Understanding how these connections are formed on social media, the purpose of these connections and how they can be leveraged is foundational to social media marketing.

Understanding social mechanics with game theory

Though the need to participate in social exchange is obvious, it has proved challenging to effectively model how social systems work, especially when considering the impact of new media and technology on societal discourse. Game theory, a mathematical evaluation of competition and cooperation between interested actors, is a promising solution.

Despite what its name may suggest, game theory has little to do with “games” as we might typically think of them. It seeks instead to understand how rational participants, bound by a set of rules, respond to different stimuli. The application of game theory to social media can help us identify the objectives of social media users, and how they work to achieve them.

The “players” of the social media “game” are clearly the users — brands and consumers alike. Brands use social media to reach new customers, build a loyal audience and respond to consumer reviews, while the private social media user wants to keep up with friends, stay current and participate in social conversations about matters large and small.

Gaining powerful allies in the social media status game

Brands and consumers have different objectives, but how they achieve their ends is the same: social influence. All social media users compete for a limited supply of influence, clamoring for their voice to be heard. The mistake that many brands make is to see consumers as targets, or even enemies, instead of the powerful allies they can be.

If brands cooperate with consumers, assisting them in achieving their objectives, both can win the social media game. Above all, this means brands must provide social media users with the tools they need to increase their status, and thereby their influence on the conversation. By doing so, brands can proliferate their messaging and gain the vocal support of a vast audience.

Social status is at the core of every human interaction, and one of our most central drives. Its significance has recently been underlined by the discovery that changes in status are processed by the striatum, the same part of the brain that processes money. Researchers found that an increase in social status triggers a definite and quantifiable neurological reward.

Increasing and measuring status with game mechanics

In conversation, we largely seek to increase our prestige, which can be done in one of three ways:

Creating new content.
Sharing content.
Challenging content.

Each of these adds value to the conversation, introducing a new perspective, supporting, or critiquing an existing perspective, which in turn increases our status.

These avenues are built into most social media platforms, with “likes,” “shares” and “comments” all enabling us to quantifiably assign status to others and evaluate our own. Like points and levels in a video game, these features allow us to measure how popular we are in a community, and our brain rewards us each time we win a point — or punishes us if we lose.

In terms of game theory, these features should be thought of as game mechanics, which leverage our:

Desire to accumulate.
Preoccupation with social standing.
Appreciation of feedback.
Interest in connecting.
Enjoyment of personalization.

By tapping into deeply embedded psychological drives, these mechanics make social media engaging and rewarding.

Brands help themselves by giving consumers a voice

Each time brands elicit feedback from consumers or release content that is exciting or interesting, they give social media users another opportunity to score social points. Making a witty comment or sharing a fun video will increase a user’s status in their community. This is clearly a win for the brand, just as much as it is for the consumer.

It is equally important to avoid disapproval as it is to build support. Social media can magnify consumer condemnation as easily as it can bolster approval. Many brands have found themselves the targets of social media callouts when consumers chastise brands for an unsatisfying product, an ill-phrased comment or a poorly timed campaign.

Game mechanics are only part of the picture

The dangers of social media are exemplified in Pepsi’s 2017 ad featuring model Kendall Jenner, which referred to recent protests against police brutality. Though it portrayed Pepsi as a reconciliatory force, bridging the gap between opposing factions through the unifying power of its product, an irate public condemned the ad as tone deaf on social media.

Pepsi’s ad failed for two important reasons. Despite the brand’s intentions, audiences found the ad inauthentic, feeling it did not align with the brand’s purpose. More importantly, the ad did not respect the seriousness of the conflict, whose racial overtones and mortal significance demanded a great degree of sensitivity in the eyes of the public.

A winning application of game theory

In stark contrast, Heineken’s Worlds Apart ad won widespread acclaim the same year. The ad depicted ideologically opposed pairs working together to build a bar, before electing to share a beer and discuss their differences. Though Heineken’s ad responded to the same social climate and expressed a similar theme of unity, it could not have been more differently received.

It is possible that the public saw beer as a more genuine point of unison over such serious issues, but the real difference lies in Heineken’s treatment of social concerns. Rather than positioning itself as a heroic savior in a trivialized conflict, it showed itself facilitating participants in their individual struggle to have their voice heard and to improve their world.

We can look at Heineken’s ad not only as a case study in sensitive and authentic messaging, but also an effective example of game theory in action. Heineken allied itself with social media users, providing them a platform from which to express themselves. In doing so, it enabled them to become heroes in their own story, winning likes, comments, and shares in their own networks.

Winning the social media marketing game

To win the social media marketing game, brands are increasingly using the behavioral insights offered by game theory to craft effective social media strategies.

While brands and consumers have seemingly different objectives, they share the same drive for social influence. By recognizing this and enabling buyers and prospects to enhance their social status, brands can create a win-win situation for consumers and shareholders alike.

By Peter Minnium

Peter Minnium is President of Ipsos Connect, where he leads the US team in helping companies measure and amplify how media, brands, and consumers connect through compelling content and great communications. Prior to his switch to market research, Peter was Head of Brand Initiatives at the IAB focused on addressing the under-representation of creative brand advertising online.

Sourced from Marketing Land

In News

Unilever CMO Keith Weed applauds Twitter for cracking down on fake followers

July 20, 2018 No Comments

By Minda Smiley

Unilever’s chief marketing and communications officer Keith Weed has commended Twitter for taking steps to eliminate fake accounts on the social platform.

On Wednesday, he tweeted that he is pleased to see Twitter “taking a big stand against the fake followers polluting the digital ecosystem.”

His comments are in response to Twitter’s recent decision to remove locked accounts from follower counts across profiles globally. Twitter locks accounts when it detects sudden changes in account behavior, like tweeting a large volume of unsolicited replies or mentions. Until now, those locked accounts remained in follower counts, but moving forward they will be removed.

“Most people will see a change of four followers or fewer; others with larger follower counts will experience a more significant drop,” wrote Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s legal, policy, and trust & safety lead, in a blog post. “We understand this may be hard for some, but we believe accuracy and transparency make Twitter a more trusted service for public conversation.”

The move comes one month after Weed expressed his concern over the issue of follower fraud at Cannes Lions. At the festival, Weed said Unilever will no longer work with influencers who buy followers and encouraged the industry as a whole to do more to curb the issue.

“The key to improving the situation is three-fold: cleaning up the influencer ecosystem by removing misleading engagement; making brands and influencers more aware of the use of dishonest practices; and improving transparency from social platforms to help brands measure impact,” Weed said at the time.

Feature Image: Keith Weed

By Minda Smiley

Sourced from The Drum

In News

Social media is making you miserable. Here’s how to delete your accounts.

July 9, 2018 No Comments

By David Nield

In theory, social media promises to connect you with the world. In practice, it compromises your personal privacy, puts you at risk of online abuse, and makes you unsatisfied and unhappy with your real life. If you’re irritated by Twitter or depressed by Facebook, you don’t have to stick around.

We’ve previously discussed a few methods to help you avoid social media for limited periods of time. When you’re ready to say goodbye for good, it’s time to delete those social apps from your phone—and shut down your accounts entirely. Here’s how to do it, one network at a time.

First steps

Before you start erasing all of your content, you might want to download some or all of it. This will let you preserve a personal copy for posterity. To do this for the biggest social networks—Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat—follow our guide to saving social media posts.

Next, make sure you’re deleting your account for the right reason. If you’re ready to bid farewell to the whirlwind of social media, that’s fine. But if you’re only closing down your current social media account so you can create a new one for a fresh start, hit pause. Your first step should be to check the do-over options the network gives you. On Instagram, for instance, you can change your username without shutting down your existing account. Once you’ve exhausted the existing options, you can move on to deactivating or deleting your account.

Facebook

When you get fed up with Facebook, you have two ways to remove yourself from the giant network: deactivation or deletion.

Let’s start with the less extreme option. If you deactivate your account, it will disappear from Facebook, but you can bring it back at any time: The network retains all of your data, which will be waiting for you if you decide to go back. Simply log in to your account again, and Facebook will reactivate it.

To deactivate your account from a web browser, visit the site and click the drop-down arrow on the top right of the screen. Choose Settings, then General, and look for the Manage account category. Next to it, you should see an Edit option. Click Edit and choose Deactivate your account. Next, Facebook will prompt you for your password and ask you to give a reason for leaving, such as privacy concerns or wasted time. Make your choice, click Deactivate, and you’re done.

You can also deactivate your account through a mobile app. On iOS, open the app and hit the menu button—a grid icon—in the lower right corner. Then tap Settings, Account Settings, General, Manage account, and Deactivate. On Android, you follow the same process, but the menu button looks like three horizontal lines and you can reach Account Settings from the first submenu.

Deactivation is a good way of testing the waters to see if you can live without Facebook. Give it a few months and see how you feel. When you’re ready to say goodbye to your account forever, it’s time to delete it. To do so, you have to visit this page in a web browser and click Delete my account. As far as your friends are concerned, you will disappear immediately. However, Facebook may take up to 90 days to fully erase all of your data. Once you do that, there’s no going back.

Twitter

If you’ve had all you can take of hashtags and tweetstorms, you can deactivate your Twitter account. For a set period, the social network will hang on to your data, but after that, it will permanently get rid of your account.

To get rid of Twitter, you need to visit this page in a web browser and scroll down to the Deactivate your account option. Read the information that Twitter provides, then click Deactivate. You’ll receive a prompt to enter your password and to confirm that yes, you really do want to deactivate your account.

Once you do so, the process of erasing your Twitter presence starts. As far as other users can see, your profile and tweets will vanish immediately. However, Twitter hangs on to your data for a grace period of 30 days (verified users get a full 12 months) to make sure you don’t change your mind. During this time, you can still log back into the site, an act that will restore your profile and all of your tweets from the digital grave.

After that 30- to 365-day period ends, Twitter will officially delete your data and you will lose it forever. So if you repent your decision and decide to return to Twitter, you’ll need to sign up for a brand new account.

Instagram

Nothing instills FOMO quite like your friends’ smug Instagram photos. Remove them from your life by either deactivating or deleting your account.

To deactivate, you have to go through the Instagram website rather than the mobile apps. Log in, click your profile icon on the top right, choose Edit Profile, and select Temporarily disable my account. Once you do that, you have to decide on a reason why you no longer feel the Instagram love—options range from Just need a break to Too many ads. Finally, enter your account password and click Temporarily Disable Account.

Much like Facebook’s deactivation option, this choice will put your account on hold. As far as other users know, your Instagram page is gone, but the social network will hang on to your photos, comments, and other data. Log into the site again, and it will instantly restore your account.

For a more permanent fix, you need to go to the dedicated Delete Your Account page online. Log in, give a reason for your defection, and enter your password. Finally, click Permanently delete my account. This will wipe all traces of your Instagram life from the network’s servers, including the likes and instant messages. If you decide to come back, you’ll have to start again from scratch.

Snapchat

If Snapchat loses its appeal, have your account disappear like the vanishing photos that made the social network a hit.

To do that, you need to open your web browser and head to this page (yes, Snapchat has a website too). Sign into your account if necessary, then enter your username and password again on the subsequent screen. (Why sign in twice? You have to prove that it really is you and express your determination to get rid of Snapchat.) Click Continue, and the process of removing you from Snapchat begins.

From this point on, your friends won’t be able to contact you on Snapchat, but as with Twitter, you get a grace period before permanent deletion occurs. Over the next 30 days, you can decide whether you really do want to depart from the world of Snapchat or not. If you log back into the network before that time is up, your account will reappear and you can carry on as before with the same username and contacts list.

After the 30 days pass, Snapchat will permanently erase your account from its network. To come back from that, you’ll have to start adding friends and collecting Snaps all over again.

Other networks

Although Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat currently dominate the app charts, they’re not the only social networks out there. Still, you can always find the option to close your account.

While these networks will let you delete your account, they won’t always make that option easy to find. So if you get stuck, check the support pages for that network, which should point you in the right direction. (To deactivate Tumblr, for example, you simply scroll down to the bottom of the settings page.) Support pages should also provide details about exactly what happens to your data when you click “delete” and how quickly it disappears from existence.

Feature Image Credit: Ditch your social apps—for good. Rahul Chakraborty via Unsplash

By David Nield

Sourced from Popular Science

In News

How to Use Facebook Advertising to Beat the Algorithm and Ensure Your Posts Are Seen

July 5, 2018 No Comments

By Kate Peers

Facebook has been experiencing a lot of bad press. Some even say that users are gravitating away from Facebook and towards other platforms.

The current statistics disagree with this assessment, however. There are still one billion active users on Facebook, which means that Facebook is still a strong place to find potential customers for your business. If you use Facebook ads efficiently, you can precisely target your audience and effectively spend for a strong return.

In this article, we examine how and when to use Facebook ads for your business.

Can I reach people without ads?

Facebook are using an algorithm which makes it more and more difficult to reach people organically through posting direct to your page. On average your posts will reach 1–3% of your audience without any ad spend. So, while can you interact with customers without ads, spending money on ads will help you reach more people, as well as more relevant people.

Should I boost a post?

Facebook is very clever. If you have ever posted anything on a business page, you’ll be familiar with the constant suggestions to “boost” your post. You may see a message that says something along the lines of, “This post is performing well, boost it now for more people to view it.”

While boosting a post can increase your customer reach, the most efficient way to interact with customers is by creating an ad from scratch.

How do I create an ad?

Before you make a start with Facebook ads, think hard about your objective. What would you like to achieve with your ad? Do you want to drive traffic to your blog? Would you like people to purchase an e-book? Are you hoping to get more page likes on Facebook and increase your followers?

All of these objectives can be achieved with Facebook ads, but make sure you have them clear before you begin, otherwise your spend will be directed towards the wrong outcome.

Target your audience

Take time to consider your dream client. Who is he or she? Do you want to target women in New York, aged between 30–45 with a high disposable income? You can do this.

Facebook has different targeting options divided into general demographics, interests, behaviors and connections. The real power of Facebook ads lies in interest and behavioral targeting. As we now know all too well, Facebook has tons of data on everyone’s interests, page likes and groups joined. If you know your audience, then you can reach them by creating an audience on Facebook.

Create a strong visual

A strong visual image is key to grab your customer’s attention. You only have one shot to make a first impression — you want to be sure that your images are clear, bright, and convey your message appropriately.

You should also be mindful about the fact that Facebook has very strict guidelines for ad creation, which tend to change a lot. You can only have text covering 20% of your image for instance, or your ad won’t deliver. Ensure your image meets these guidelines before you spend unnecessary time and money on an ad that doesn’t work.

Test, trial and respond to each ad

Facebook insights allow you to track how well an ad has performed. Price per click, number of times the ad was seen and adding URL tags to your ads mean that with a combination of Google analytics and Facebook insights you can play around with a small budget.

It is important to test to see what your audience responds to and ensure you are spending your money to achieve good results. If you notice that no one’s clicking on an ad, you may want to pause it. But, if you notice that hundreds of people are responding, you may want to add more spend and reach more people.

Once you get it right, the results will be mind blowing.

Final thoughts

There are few ways to reach your audience that are as direct and effective as Facebook advertising. If you’ve been hesitant to try out Facebook ads, now’s the time to give it a go.

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Feature Image Source: Shutterstock

By Kate Peers

Kate Peers is the writer of the Mad About The Boys blog. A social media and marketing manager, she secretly wants to write a book one day. She is the a contributing author of Walking In The Rain and Washing Up Is Good For You, curated books by Department Store For The Mind. Her work can also be found on Metro online.

Sourced from The Writing Cooperative

In News

Social CRM: Top Three Business Benefits

June 22, 2018 No Comments

By Emma James

These days, it seems like an increasing number of people are using social media for one reason or another. Is your business taking the best advantage of social media to promote company products and services? No? Then, it’s time to take the best advantage of social media with the help of social customer relationship management tool.

Use social CRM tools for a better customer engagement, monitor and track the conversations of your customers’ and clients on social media platforms in real-time, respond quickly to customer complaints and queries, identify industry trends through real-time social monitoring, actively analyse the social media data to make well informed business decisions, as well as enhance your brand image.

Social CRM software is helpful for your business to provide personalized customer service in real-time as well as to improve customer loyalty. Moreover, the social CRM system fosters in developing strong customer relationships by enabling your business to track the right customer conversations in real-time on various social media platforms, as well as analyse what type of content your competitors are sharing on their social networking platforms.

Additionally, social media platforms offer several advantages to businesses of all sizes. Here are the top three business benefits of social CRM:

1. Builds Profitable Customer Relationships

Do you want your business to build a strong brand presence on social media? Do you want to reap maximum profits as well as high return on investments through social channels? Social CRM tool will help you reach all your business goals. It will enable you to reach a higher number of potential customers’ as well as to reap the maximum profits through effective tracking of clients, customers’, as well as your competitors’ social influences. By analysing the customers’ tastes and interest, the marketing team can produce relevant and engaging content, which can surely impress your customers’ and followers. Thus, the producing of highly impressive marketing content can enable your audience to instantly like your content, share it across their friends and family members on various social media channels, as well as the ability to foster healthy and profitable customer relationships.

2. Identify the Right Platforms

Obviously, it takes a lot of time and dedication to produce high-quality, engaging, and original content. However, if the produced content doesn’t reach the right social media channels; then all the hard work you put in generating the relevant content will go vanish. You can avoid this if you can invest your money in the right social CRM solution. It helps in identifying the right social media networking channel as per your business needs and requirements.

An appropriate social CRM tool will tell your company – which social channels are correct for your brand, where you can find the targeted audience, as well as at what time your potential audience groups are active on the social networking channels. All this information will help your business to produce the content on the right social channels and at the right time, which can aid in gaining more momentum on the various social platforms.

3. Boosts Your Business SEO Activities

Earlier, it was difficult for businesses to create the customer-centric content. However, with the help of social CRM software, businesses can easily analyse the digital footprints of customers’ as well as identify the targeted and potential audience groups. Using the solutions of social CRM software, businesses can have a comprehensive understanding of what their targeted audience is searching on social networking channels, their likes, and dislikes, as well as what type of content they are liking and sharing by analysing the type of keywords your customers’ are using to search for content on the various social platforms.

Using this information, businesses can create targeted, shareable, and engaging content that your followers and customers’ would find interesting. While generating the content, you can even add the specified keywords used by your audience so that they can easily find your business content in their relevant searches. If your generated content is truly engaging and valuable, then your customers’ will surely like and share the content across various social media channels, which can ultimately boost your website SEO. Moreover, if your content has a higher number of shares, likes, and comments it will send a positive signal to the Google that your content is highly impressive and original, which can enable your website to be top-ranked on the Google search engine results page.

So, what are you waiting for? Empower your business today with the right social CRM technology to grasp hold of the wonderful business opportunities present in the market today!

By Emma James

Sourced from Digital Doughnut

In News

You Can’t Treat Social Media as an Add-on or Afterthought

June 21, 2018 No Comments

By Brendan Gahan

Here are three ways to help — not hurt — your brand on social media.

Social media has become increasingly influential as a method to reach consumers, but the ad world hasn’t prioritized it accordingly.

Today, seven out of 10 Americans use social media. Despite the opportunity (and in spite of the lip-service paid to social), more marketers are skimping on their approach. Reposting 30-second TV spots to YouTube and uploading billboard or print ads to Instagram are commonplace, and a detriment to your brand.

Below are a few tips to keep in mind as you craft your digital marketing campaign so that you don’t fall into the same trap.

1. “Social extensions” aren’t the answer.

We all know the truism from advertising: good, fast or cheap — pick two.

More often than not, the expectation for social is to deliver on all three. This cognitive dissonance leaves social caught in marketing purgatory — the known priority that’s never actually prioritized.

Furthermore, our language reflects what we deem important. When agencies and brands discuss “social extensions,” it implies that social is an add-on to a campaign rather than a central component that underpins the whole thing.

The language of “social extensions” recontextualizes the social media marketing workflow as a reflexive, uncreative process. This term is commonly used for presenting social as a budget-friendly way to build out an integrated campaign. The reasoning goes something like: “Why create something new and purpose-built when we haven’t fully tapped the resources already at our disposal?”

This answer is simple: You do it because “new” and “purpose-built” are the only things that win eyeballs these days.

It’s easy to “repurpose” existing marketing materials for social and pretend that your TV spot is actually serving dual purposes when in reality it is serving one master: TV.

2. Think like a consumer.

Behaviorally, social is “opt in.” Consumers are blocking ads, and every piece of content is competing with the entire internet.

Think about it: Porn is a click away. YouTube has 1 billion hours of video watched per day. There’s so much competition that you need to stand out and answer the question, “Why would someone choose to watch this?” If you don’t have the answer, you’re irrelevant and/or burning cash.

When focusing on organic content you need to be a provocateur and generate an emotional response from people to stand out and be noticed.

According to Jonah Berger, author of Contagious, emotions play a critical role in how much earned media content will generate. His study “What Makes Online Content Viral?” showed that, “Content that evokes high-arousal positive (awe) or negative (anger or anxiety) emotions is more viral. Content that evokes low-arousal, or deactivating, emotions (e.g., sadness) is less viral.”

The TL;DR version being — if your content doesn’t make someone laugh, cry, yell or jump out of their seat — odds are it is not going to be shared much. Evoking an emotional response in a physical way was the greatest indicator of how “viral” content was going to be.

Wendy’s, for example, has won new attention for savagely roasting and mocking its Twitter followers — a real and valid audience that has nothing to do with fast food. YouTube stars are more famous among millennials than conventional celebrities. Marketing influence is shifting toward the technological.

3. Make bespoke content.

You must ideate and produce content with social in mind.

In the same way that everyone looks their best in custom suits or dresses, the most memorable brand messages are built from scratch and tailored to the brand and platform specifications — they are distinctly one-of-a-kind.

With social, we’re dealing with a multitude of nuances. There isn’t one print magazine size that can fit everywhere; there is no 30-second spot that works on every platform. There is no one-size-fits-all social ad unit (at least not one that is effective).

Each platform has its own ad specs and dimensions. For example: You can run six-second, 15-second or 30-second videos, and you need to plan for those to work with sound on and (most likely) off. You can create vertical video for stories on Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook, and then you have to have horizontal content for YouTube. The creative options are endless.

The point of all this is that we operate in a noisy media landscape, so brands have to create content uniquely tuned to thrive on the internet to make an impact. This means making something original and memorable enough to harness a worldwide, internet-connected community and tailor that content for specific platforms. This is the path to success in social media.

Let’s see your print ad get enough retweets to do that.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Feature Image credit: Hero Images | Getty Images

By Brendan Gahan

Sourced from FLIPBOARD

In News

Native Video study on open web highlights consumer shift

June 20, 2018 No Comments

By Dale Lovell

he power of video advertising may be well documented, but as consumer behaviour changes amid familiarity with video browsing on mobile devices, marketers who think the rules of engagement for digital video have already been written – and that there is a one size fits all approach – should think again.

The rise and effectiveness of native video on social media has been well researched to date. Engagement rates, reach, frequency and return on investment studies all show positive associations. But until now, there have been few studies showing the rise and performance of native video formats across the open web, specifically on premium publisher environments, where in-feed native video formats are becoming increasingly common.

We recently sought to fill that void through an analysis of more than 30 million in-feed video views run across our platform from January to April 2018. While we expected to be able to report findings on native video on the open web that were in line with the positive findings in social media, we didn’t expect that our findings would challenge the very notion of ‘what works’ in native video. But that’s precisely what happened.

Conventional wisdom in the video space, based on social data, has indicated that less is more when it comes to native video advertising, with many espousing that anything longer than 6 seconds in native video is simply too long. However, our findings would seem to contradict the perceived wisdom that mobile users have limited attention spans and are only interested in short video content.

According to our findings, smartphone users are more likely to spend time engaging with long-form video ads compared to 6-second ads when executed correctly. In fact, 72% of mobile users who have watched 6 seconds will continue to watch and engage with video up to 22 seconds. When native video reaches 15 to 22 seconds in length across premium publisher environments, mobile and tablet users that have watched this far are significantly more engaged than desktop users.

The evolution of our ‘mobile minds’

Perhaps it shouldn’t be all that surprising that people’s attention spans for native video seem to be growing longer. While the findings in our report represent the first of their kind in native video, there have been several studies undertaken around the attention of mobile phone users when it comes to reading. Over time, conclusions have shifted.

One study in 2010 found that reading on a mobile device was impaired when content was presented on a mobile-size screen versus a larger computer screen. But a similar study, undertaken six years later in 2016, showed different results. This study, conducted by the Nielsen Norman Group, concluded that there were no practical differences in the comprehension scores of participants, whether they were reading on a mobile device or a computer. In fact, the study found comprehension on mobile was about 3% higher than on a computer for content that was just over 400 words in length, and at an easier level to read.

Why the difference in results? It’s very possible that, over the period between 2010 and 2016 — the exact period during which smartphones became ubiquitous — we’ve all become more accustomed to reading on smaller screens. It’s reasonable to assume that the challenges the average person had reading on a small screen back in 2010 no longer apply now that people have adjusted to life on those smaller screens.

In a similar manner, it would appear that user behavior is changing around video consumption on mobile devices as well.

Well-held assumptions that less-is-more for video length and the broader worries about a crisis in user attention spans very well may prove to have been misplaced.

Creating compelling video content

As attention spans for native video lengthen, marketers would do well to reassess their best practices as it relates to creating content for mobile consumption. In particular, native video creators should think carefully about improving video performance during the key drop-off periods on a specific device.

For videos that will be consumed on mobile or tablet, videos should be edited to pack a punch in the first 6 seconds, in order to draw in users. The latest data suggests that the optimal length for native video content on mobile and tablet should be between 15 and 22 seconds. After 22 seconds, user interest does wane. If videos have to be longer, marketers should ensure that there are more-exciting sequences and enticing calls to action around 22 seconds, in order to maintain viewer interest up to 30 seconds.

If nothing else, these recent findings demonstrate that marketers must remain fluid in their understanding of how users engage with content on their devices. Behaviour is shifting, and yesterday’s best practices won’t necessarily apply tomorrow.

By Dale Lovell

Dale Lovell is co-founder of Adyoulike

Sourced from THE DRUM

In News

How to Manage Social Media Without it Taking Up All Your Time

June 8, 2018 No Comments

By Julie Graff

Ok, we all know that social media marketing is, like, totally awesome. It can boost your business’ exposure, traffic, yada, yada, yada. Some even say web marketing can’t survive without it.

But in all of its awesomeness, there is one caveat about social media marketing: It takes time. A lot of it. Especially if you’re doing it right (i.e. actually engaging with your audience and not just posting links to your site). In fact, 63% of marketers spend 6 or more hours a week on social media marketing activities, and nearly 19% spend more than 20 hours a week.

Sorry, I can’t magically take away all of your social media marketing duties. But I do have some tips to speed the process along.

1. Limit It

We all know not to jump off a bridge just because everyone else does. So why do so many businesses basically do exactly that when it comes to social media?

Nobody has time to engage on all of the networks they “should” be on. The only real reason to be on a social network is because your audience is there, and you believe you can engage with them there.

The first step, then, is to figure out where they are. This takes a little detective work, but it will save you time by narrowing down the networks you need to engage on.

Start slow, building a presence on the network that is most popular with your audience first. Once you’ve established your presence, and have streamlined your participation there, then you can move on to the next most popular network for your audience.

If your audience isn’t there, don’t waste resources on it, no matter how popular it may be in general.

2. Automate It

This is a bit of a touchy subject, but the bottom line is you have to automate some of your social media participation – unless social media is your only job.

But just like any technology, social media automation can be abused. You should never, for example, automate responses. Case in point – no one wants an automated tweet that says “Thanks for sharing” every time someone shares one of your tweets.

You should always seek to engage in real-time. This is also another reason why you should take it one social network at a time, so that you can ensure you have the resources to respond in a timely manner when someone engages with your company on social media.

There are typically three types of social media tools you need to improve your efficiency:

Scheduling: Scheduling tools enable you to plan your posts in advance so you don’t have to be on social media every time you want a post to go out. I mostly use Buffer to schedule posts from our blog and curated content. I’ve also put a number of evergreen posts into Social Jukebox because, unlike Buffer, it will put the posts back into a queue to be continually re-published.
Curation: You need easy ways to find valuable information from other experts that you can share. I like using Tweetdeck to monitor the streams of industry influencers. I also use the RSS reader Feedly to keep up with the best digital marketing blogs, and I subscribe to some forum digests and industry newsletters that also provide great articles to share. I recently discovered another tool called Nuzzel which creates a newsletter based on what your friends are engaging with on social media.
Monitoring: You also need to know if someone mentions your business or industry on social media, so that you can engage in those conversations and address any issues. Tweetdeck is good for monitoring Twitter streams, while Mention and SEMRush can help you keep tabs on your mentions across the internet.

3. Analyze It

Again, you’re not doing social media just to do it – you’re doing it to achieve certain goals for business.

You need to decide what those goals are (brand awareness, traffic, sales), then you need to track your social media metrics to see if your efforts are working toward those goals.

A good place to start is Google Analytics. Traffic isn’t the be-all end-all of metrics, but you do want to ensure that your social media efforts are bringing in traffic, and which platforms are doing that the best.

If a network isn’t bringing in much traffic, you may want to reconsider what you’re posting there, or question if the network is worth your time at all. But keep in mind, traffic is only part of the story. If you’re seeing a lot of engagement (shares, likes, comments, etc.), you’re raising brand awareness, and you may want to keep on keepin’ on.

We like True Social Metrics to track engagement and to see which posts performed the best. Each social network offers its own analytics as well, which can give you some of this information. Additionally. I often use Buffer’s analytics to determine which posts resonated with our audience, and then reschedule them so that they can be discovered by people who may not have seen them the first time around.

The point is, you want to figure out which social media efforts are helping you meet your goals and which aren’t, so you can focus your time on those that bring you ROI.

4. Time It

Social media has a well-earned reputation of being a time suck, so you should also decide, ahead of time, how long you’re going to allocate to it – even set a timer if you’re prone to zoning out. Just make sure that you’re setting aside a sufficient amount of time to get the job done right.

There’s no doubt about it, social media requires a time investment, but when done right, it’s one that can reap big rewards for your company. Using these tips, you’ll be able to better fit social media marketing into your busy schedule – without losing your mind.