Is social media still effective as a marketing tool?

With more than 300 social networks available on the market we tend to ask the question if all this posting is worth the hassle and if people even read post made by a small business. In some cases when organizations use social media as a marketing tool the messages can be seen as span, but there are a few ways in which social media can still be used effectively as a marketing tool which will now be discussed:

Community orientated

One of the advantages of running a small business page is the community in which it subsides. Posting about the annual cherry festival the town hosts and where your company will be contributing makes you part of the community. This can make people more open to your company and see it as part of their everyday lives because you are part of newsworthy events or actions in their direct community.

Effective campaigns

Having an effective and striking campaign can really enhance participation from followers. Doing something striking like a game or puzzle that does not require too much effort from the user  can help your company strike jackpot and bring a playful element to your page and not just another advertisement post. Examples are Purple Lucozade campaign and Infinity chewing gum campaign.

Interesting

If your posts are interesting people will stop and stare, using your unique brand attributes that you have developed in your social media your page is supposed to stand out and attract more attention. Like Savanna, a alcoholic beverage, who’s brand is a very dry but funny brand who made this post:

“Are you following us on Instagram yet? We've got some awesome, never-before seen images from behind the scenes at our TVC shoots.”

Could have rather said something that would complement their brand and is similar  like:

”Josh saw that he had a new follower, his neighbour Araujo; the camera in the kitchen kind of gave it away. Now he spends his free time following back, all the way back to his gangs head counters, it seems like the right thing to do. Savannah its dry, but you can drink it. Follow us on Instagram for inside photo’s and video’s of Josh’s “last words”, oh Araujo with his jokes.

Selling the essence of the product, not the product

Selling the feel of a product’s experience rather than giving information about the product can attract more users. When selling a barbecue sell the feeling of braai (Barbecuing), when selling a laptop sell the feeling of being connected and when selling a loan sell the experience of being in control and owning something.

With social media it is important to remember that you are entering a social environment and anything that you would normally discuss at a social event can be used if you are not going to talk about the triple cartridges that a printer could offer for only R499, then don’t advertise it that way.

Some word about Strategies

When you look up the definition of strategy, you get the following definition:

“A  plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim”

The word designed struck me, because often we find that companies just use a demo-strategy and implement it in their business. But he word strategy actually means that a unique different plan should be conceptualized through thorough research and attention to the purpose of the strategy.

In terms of social media, the first question to ask is: “What is the aim of the strategy?” The answer to this may be to get more traffic to your webpage via social media or to create an online community or get more likes on a page. However this answer is not complete enough. One could even go further into it and ask why you want to get more traffic to your webpage or to create an online community or get more likes on a page?

The answer to this question is not that simple, but it can be roughly explained. The purpose of your organisation should be pulled through all strategies in the business. This is called a single minded proposition which tells the costumer what the brand is all about. An example of this would be Coca Cola who’s singe minded proposition is Spreading happiness. With their strategy on social media the core reason for implementing a social media strategy apart from getting more likes or customers their strategy will be spreading happiness. This means that creating a playful page will be more important than sending out e-mails that say LIKE MY PAGE. If your single minded proposition is strong enough it will sell the brand page and your strategy will be original finding a place in your online community.

Getting more Followers on twitter:

Being smart can get you up to 100 more followers than you should have had if you use the rite tools and perfect timing. Here is a few tips from experience to get you more followers.

1.     Including as many @’s in your tweet. When tweeting, make sure you are including the parties involved in the event, product or topic you’re talking about. This means your post is not just static, but that people actually read it who is involved, may favour it and also retweet it to their followers who can start following you.

2.     Use of hashtags. This is especially important on occasions where there is a specific hashtag created for the event. By using the hashtag and giving the latest updates to the event/product other future followers can easily find you by searching the hashtag and following you when they see you are giving the latest information through.  

3.     Retweet others. This may feel like the wrong move to make, but give credit to the source that gave the information. This will make you look more like a reliable source and not just another tweeter who tries to get as many followers, but one who can network with others to make their social media interesting, reliable and transparent.

4.     Favour Tweets. By having an opinion, you make your social media profile seem stronger, this will also make people positive towards you and inspire them to interact more.

5.     Follow back. This is a kind favor you can do to somebody in the Twitterworld. Following someone is not as great of a commitment as having them as a Facebook friend. The more followers you have, the more news you can receive to share to your followers and besides, the person can always be unfollowed later…

Be a smart tweeter and tweet it right! Keep those fingers typing!

Vary your mediums

Here is a simple demo of using different mediums for your social media:

Simple posts:

Start the marketing of any event of by making simple posts to present your message. Give as much information as possible trough to your users by just making posts. These posts can be accompanied by an external link to other relevant pages or websites. Anything that can give a post more information can be considered as more interactive.

Video:

Video is the future because of the lazy audience created by online media. People don’t like reading. Are you still reading this? This information even if it is not visual, can be presented so much better with a video. The good thing about video is that you can use text, visuals and sound to get your message across. Overall video is just more interesting. Videos can be uploaded though youtube or just as a video on most social media platforms using flash.

Voting pall:

People like to have their voice be heard without putting in too much effort. By choosing a light topic to which most listeners can respond, you can create a great participating and  responding audience. When for instance you own a blinds and curtains company, one can post a poll about the weirdest thing your followers have ever seen through a window.

Voice note:

This is especially great for short interviews of news related stories that you want to be published on your social media. A voice note can give a good description of some event that took place or a detailed description. Sound can be loaded onto hosts like Soundcloud and be shared via Social media.

The power of visual:

Visuals add character to a community post or to attract attention. Make sure pictures have your company’s look and feel so that the message can be spread more effectively. Visuals can explain an event, illustrate something or start a conversation. Visuals are very effective because most internet users will be attracted to graphical material than reading another text post in their feed.

Hashtags:

With hashtags on both Facebook and Twitter, you can now easily get more exposure for your messages by adding a relevant hashtag.

Vine is taking over

Some of you may have heard about the new social media application (app) available on the web called Vine. Here is some clarification about that you can do with the app and if it is needed for your businesses social media.

Vine is originally owned by Twitter and is a app that allows you to upload 7 minute videos to the web and share it via Twitter. The app opened in October 2012 and is starting to get more popular; so much so that it can be seen as a marketing tool.

Vine has 15 channels or categories in which you can submit or explore new videos.Vine is currently being used by big companies like Nissan and Honda and is on the forefront of viral marketing. Because so many consumers use their phones instead of  computers to access social media, this makes the mobile app a great marketing tool seeing that in South-Africa there are more people that have a cell phone than people what have a home. 

Organisations that visualize their marketing like to show what they are doing how something works or what a certain product can offer. In this case a video can be a very interactive way of advertising the company’s assets. If this company happens to have a Twitter account, it makes it easier to spread the video on social media to allow it to flourish.

Examples of companies that can use this as a marketing tool is: Extreme/outdoors businesses, inventions companies, Arts and entertainment companies, a theme parks or a lodge.

To learn more about this app or download it, go to https://blog.twitter.com/2013/vine-new-way-share-video and upload your videos. In the past week more than 20 Vine videos have gone viral, imagine what it could do for your business.

How to deal with Internet problems when running a social media page:

Good reception in this tree!

Living in Africa sometimes has challenges for a social media manager or blogger. The past mouth I found myself in a rural district, doing my internship at a tourism company, and found myself on a daily basis struggling with internet problems. Here is some of the ways I overcome those problems:

1.    Smartphones:

Lucky for you we live in a 21^st centaury, which allows you to make updates from your phone. When running a page always remember that a smart phone can help you to make updates on your social media, as well as post photos when at an event. Make sure that your page is set up while you’re in good reception to make the process easier when you don’t have perception.

2.    Work on your laptop by tethering on your phone

When you plug your phone into your computer, you can use your smart phone as a modem to go on to the internet. The tethering function allows you to do that. When plugged into your laptop your phone will give you the option or you can turn it on at your internet settings.

3.    Data bundles instead of minutes

Make sure that your airtime or minutes, is switched to data. This will help you save money with all the reconnecting due to bad perception. It will also allow you to estimate how many megabytes you have left on your airtime and how many you’re using uploading or downloading from the internet.

4.    Schedule your posts

Some social media allows you to schedule posts, which can help you ahead of time when you know you’ll be going somewhere that might not have internet. The only problem with this is that you have no control over the future and what may happen or change in it. This also means that you won’t be able to give feedback on the posts if you don’t have internet access.

Fighting bad reception, or isn’t that bad if you prepare for it, even if you have to climb into a tree to get reception. Good luck and may the reception be on your side. 

Ten mistakes made on Social media:

1)    The look and feel of the social media does not portray the corporate identity.

Brian Solis, @briansolisInconsistent branding on different social media sites. So many businesses have a corporate identity on their web site, but seem to forget about their Social media’s corporate visual message.  By customizing the page of all your social media like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn a professional profile can be obtained for your business. Some of the elements used in the website can also be reused on the social media pages but must be adapted according to the nature of the media.

2)    Assuming the audience knows what you are talking about

Often we find that posts are made from an internal point of view from the organisations side. As many organisations assume that the reader knows exactly what the post is about. Examples of this is:  “The winner is: Bob Stern!” Making posts without creating context lowers the professionalism and connectedness of the online community.

3)    Giving a humanly touch to your social media

The word social means interaction. Some organisations like to keep their social media formal in such a way that the business can be seen as serious. However this doesn’t always reach people on social media the way that it should. People like to talk to people, not machines, but there is a fine line between adding a human touch and being too informal. The trick is to maintain that balance throughout your social media. Replying on some non business related questions and statements is a good way of adding a humanly touch.

4)    Making small-talk.

Small talk is a good way to add a humanly touch to a page but is sometimes used too much on pages. Making a post about the weather is a way of associating with users but also a way of irritating them. Use small talk post to create a community but don’t combine it with a marketing post, or your community will lose interest and see you as a spammer.

5)    Spamming

A lot of companies often spam their users by posting the same or various messages on their social media at once. If building up a loyal audience is what you aim to do, this is not the best way to keep them coming back for more if you keep pushing it down their thoughts. Plan a posting schedule that will give your audience optimal reach. Rather try to change wording or send different messages derived from a main message, than to continuously send the same message.

6)    Trying to ride on free marketing.

According to Jayson @JaysonDeMers, most companies think that they won’t have to pay for marketing. To be effective, social media requires strategic planning and dedicated resources which means that you might have to consider boosting posts on your page or making use of the advertising available on social media.

7)    Having a page without using it.

Some businesses think that they should jump on the social media train just because most businesses are on social media. If the organisation doesn’t keep the social media updated by making frequent posts, they are wasting their time. It is better to not be on social media and focus more on other mediums like your website, than for the social media to be neglected.

8)    Not being interactive

The whole point of social media is to be interactive. Responses on questions, taking opinions of users in to account and giving users what they want is important. If you are not using social media for connections with users or other companies and just posting information like a bulletin board, you might as well send all your posts out in envelopes with a no return stamp.

9)    Thinking that all your users has seen a post

Most social media works on a basis that orders newsfeed so that the user’s friends or followers with whom they had the most interaction will appear more in their newsfeed. So your page’s post is not that likely to reach all your users according to Courtney Seiter, @marketingland. This is why the right timing can play an important role in making posts on your social media.

10) Long posts

Users have lazy scanning eyes and like to read short sentences that get right to the point. This is applicable in different ways depending on the social media. On Facebook for instance, some organisations think that if they post all the relevant information about a certain event that they will communicate effectively, where people will easily scroll down and read shorter posts. It is important to only tease the user to read more on your page or other form of communication. If they want to read more they can do so by choice, put a link in your post to get them to your to your website or blog.