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3 ideas to increase social media engagement

27th May, 2019

Because Zuck doesn’t like it unless your audience does.

Just putting out content isn’t enough anymore; every brand and its mother has a social profile, many even have regular content! What they lack is social media engagement. Engagement is what makes your socials stand out and pay off.

We’re talking real engagement, not the kind you pay for. Content that gets real people liking, talking and sharing is the gold standard in social media marketing. But how do you achieve this elusive engagement? We have some ideas.

1) Be a human

To increase social media engagement you need to be engaging. Is your 3 paragraph Facebook post about the new office coffee machine exciting for your audience? Do they care about that staged photo of your suited employees looking hard at work? Maybe they do but we doubt it.

You don’t have to abandon your brand identity to make your content more engaging. Ask your audience questions relevant to what your post talks about. Make use of interactive posts like polls and quizzes. Smile in your photos. However corporate your brand might be, we guarantee you can maintain your professionalism while ensuring people smash that like button!

The silhouette of many hands in the air, behind them red party lights and a sign saying "community"

2) Video. Video. Video.

Did you know that social media posts with video get 48% more views? Or that video content is favoured by the infamous algorithms? Or that 72% of customers would rather learn about a product or service through video?

British Study Centres saw the power of video marketing when we worked with them on their football and language program. They wanted to grab the attention of parents and students across the world to generate increased traffic and interest and that’s exactly what they got. The video gained almost 50k views through a Facebook campaign in under a month and resulted in increased in traffic of over 100% to their websites with large increases in their key markets Spain (+665%), Mexico (+2.5k%), UK (+199%), Ireland (+1.5k%) and Brazil (+300%). With stats like that can you really afford not to be using video?

3) Talk to the people!

When people do start engaging, engage right back! Ask them follow up questions, share some extra info with them, send them a little thank you. The person who takes the time to comment on your post and doesn’t get so much as a like in return will not be commenting again. Appreciate your fans, show them how much you value their social media engagement, make them feel special.

Is social media engagement really worth the effort?

That depends if you think increased website hits, increased sales, a happier customer base and an amazing brand reputation are worth investing in.

If you think yes, it’s worth it, and want to leverage the power of engagement in your next social campaign, we’d love to help. Whether you’re in need of a sports commercial or something totally different, drop us a line.

Someone lying outside on a blanket reading a book about digital marketing.

Why your ad budget needs to pivot to social

13th May, 2019

In the immortal words of Ross from Friends, “PIVOT!”

Social ads are currently dramatically cheaper than traditional forms of advertising and yet precious few businesses are taking advantage of that. With impressive targeting capabilities, smaller costs, and the ability to reach more than 3.48 billion people, if your ad budget doesn’t include social media you’re doing it wrong.

The same but different

The temptation may be to simply re-purpose your current advertising material across social media, don’t do that!

Social ads should tie in to your other marketing efforts but they need to be tailored to the platform they’re running on. Nobody is sitting through the two minute long pre-rolls on YouTube or clicking the billboard style poster they scroll past on Facebook.

When a client asks us to create a cohesive video marketing strategy we start by looking at the whole picture; who are they as a brand? Who are their current customers? What excites their social followers? From this distanced view we then begin to slowly zoom in. One idea sparks another, or a twist on it which makes it better suited to a certain platform, and we begin to build the campaign as a whole and as the individual pieces.

Making it work

The Visit Scotland marketing team nailed this concept but as we looked at their campaign in more detail our blog post about community driven advertising we’re focusing on another brand knocking it out of the park when it comes to online and offline marketing. Velux’s latest campaign, #outsidein, combines all the ingredients of great modern advertising and bakes them into a delicious, shareable content cake.

Their artistic and thought-provoking short film is perfect for airing on television and also offers beautiful stills ideal for billboards, while their campaign specific website provides a variety of articles designed for social sharing and even brings in influencer partnerships. Their branded hashtags also make it easy for them to monitor the success of the campaign and engage with the people talking about it. Shout-out to the team behind this beautifully cohesive campaign.

Someone lying outside reading a book about digital marketing and social ads

All industries can benefit from this kind of creative, cross platform advertising, even the financial sector. Branded hashtags are a good way to start and a place to build from. What do you want people to be sharing about your brand on social: are you #ForTheFrugal or offering a luxury financial service? Creating a campaign around this enables you to ensure every piece of marketing material offers the same message but in distinct, medium specific ways. You don’t need to include the hashtag on your printed materials for them to tie in beautifully to the online content, use design elements to bring the different areas together in a subtle but clear way.

Social ads are the future

The legend that is Gary Vaynerchuk has said many times that advertising on social will not be this affordable forever. As more brands see ever-increasing ROI from them the price and competition for news feed space will only increase. Now is the time to invest in your social marketing strategy and embrace the power of social media advertising.

Want to discuss how we can bring your A-game to your social ads? Drop us an email.