Choosing The Right Social Media
How Companies Should Approach Social Media
In today’s day and age, there are more avenues than ever for communication, and there seems to be a new social media platform every time we turn around. “In the words of Howard Shultz, social media is a bullet train, and it's not going to slow down any time soon. 2.46 billion people are currently active on social media. By 2019, that number is expected to reach 2.77 billion. It's no surprise then, that 80% of businesses say that social media is the most important factor in their digital marketing success,” (Welch, n.d.). Then, it is no wonder that a social media strategy is required for businesses looking for marketing success. However, Welch states that before getting into strategy, it is important to know the company’s purpose and goals (n.d.). In other words, what are they trying to accomplish with social media? Who are they trying to reach? Social Media is a powerful tool to use for marketing in the modern age, but it needs to be used wisely. Companies need to research which platform is best for them by looking at data to determine where their target audience is based. This could mean multiple platforms or channels, or it could mean one primary platform or channel. This decision will differ for each company or brand.
Choosing A Platform
Number of Facebook users (Barnhart, 2021).
This is not to say that companies can’t have more than one platform. However, they will want to (need to) post different content to each channel if they decide to go the route of using multiple platforms. This is because one piece of content or advertisement may have a great response on one channel and that same content or advertisement may not perform well on another channel.
Choosing a primary social media platform can be tricky. As previously mentioned, knowing which age groups use which social media is only one of the many factors that need to be considered when selecting networks. Other factors include the marketing goals of the business, other demographic and psychographic details about the audience and target market and knowing each social media platform’s purpose. Below are some examples of social networks and their intended purpose as determined by Jason DeMers of Search Engine Land and summarized by Thomas:
- Image-Based Platforms: Pinterest, Instagram, Tumblr
- “Kitchen Sink” Platforms: Facebook, Twitter
- Video Networks: Vimeo, YouTube
- Professional, Business-Focused Networks: LinkedIn
- SEO and Authorship Platforms: Google+
- Location-Based Networks: Foursquare, Yelp
- Niche Networks: Reddit
(2018)
If a business decides to go the route of one primary social media channel with other secondary channels, the primary can be determined by the platform with the higher engagement or conversion rates, higher concentration of target audience, as well as return on investment. Secondary channels can be those that are still relevant to the target audience but have ads and content that differs from that of the ads and content on the primary channel, as well as running them less frequently.
Multiple Platforms
As mentioned previously, a company can use multiple social media platforms for their marketing purposes as long as it’s done correctly. In these cases, it’s important to know how to repurpose, repackage, and recycle content (for posts and ads) for each channel and respective audience for maximum conversion.
Content That Turns Conversion
The content produced by a company or brand that is shared as an advertisement or a post on social media has the opportunity to drive traffic to make conversions by directing the audience to perform or complete a desirable task. Shane Barker shared five items needed to create high-converting content:
1. Write a killer headline
2. Intrigue readers with your intro
3. Add visuals
4. Make it easy-to-read
5. Create a compelling call to action
(2021)
Content, however, will appear in different formats depending on the social media platform. Refer to the previous list above. For example, Instagram and Pinterest rely on visually dominant content, while Facebook and Twitter can both use a combination of text and visuals, with Twitter being more reliant on text. Content with the purpose of conversion, therefore, should factor into a business’s decision on which social media channels to adopt.
Southwest Airlines
Southwest Airlines is a great example of a brand that can pull off using multiple social media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. But Southwest is a large corporation, and what works for them won’t necessarily work for a smaller brand. Southwest does a great job of posting content to each of their channels that follows the best practices for each. It’s important to keep true to the brand’s personality while also making it relatable to the audience on each platform. For instance, see the image of their Pinterest feed below and compare it to their Instagram feed also below. Both are visual platforms, but both are serving different purposes. According to Southwest Airline’s Pinterest page, the brand has 27.4 thousand followers with 10 million monthly views. Their Instagram account has 753 thousand followers and also features more storytelling type content as well as user-generated content.
Pinterest feed (Southwest Airlines, n.d.).
Instagram feed (@Southwestair, n.d.).
In conclusion, there’s no wrong answer as to how many social media accounts a company or brand wants to run, but there is a way to determine which platforms are more suitable. Larger companies will have an easier time holding down the fort on multiple platforms while smaller brands should keep their eggs to only a select number of baskets.
References
Barker, S. (2021, February 22). How to Create High-Converting Content. Retrieved from
Barnhart, B. (2021, March 9). Social Media Demographics to Inform Your Brand’s Strategy in 2021. Retrieved from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/new-social-media-demographics/
DeMers, J. (2014, March 19). How To Choose The Right Social Media Networks For Your B2B Business. Retrieved from https://searchengineland.com/choose-right-social-media-networks-b2b-business-186307
[@Southwestair]. (n.d.). Instagram feed. Retrieved from https://www.instagram.com/southwestair/?hl=en
Southwest Airlines. (n.d.). Pinterest feed. Retrieved from https://www.pinterest.com/southwestair/_created/
Thomas, M. (2018, March 19). How to Find the Right Social Media Platforms for Your Marketing Strategy. Retrieved from https://www.bluehost.com/blog/how-to-find-the-right-social-media-platforms-for-your-marketing-strategy/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=genericsearch&gclsrc=aw.ds&&gclid=CjwKCAjwx6WDBhBQEiwA_dP8rc057DQML7aNujvpABroK9Abn6NLdzV_kmA5GGy35YbaObycZCKt8hoC1sQQAvD_BwE
Welch, K. (n.d.). Social Media Strategy: How to Create the Right Approach For Your Business On Social. Retrieved from https://www.bluefountainmedia.com/blog/social-media-strategy-how-to-create-the-right-approach-for-your-business-on-social
You mentioned a really interesting point pertaining to brands using multiple channels to market. It is important to repackage and recycle content. The same content can be created for various social media channels, but it is important for marketers to know who they are marketing to and how to most effectively get the message across on specific channels. A long-form video can be created for Facebook which can be shortened for TikTok and transferred over to YouTube. It's all about adaptability.
ReplyDeleteYou talked about repackaging and recycling content. One trend I've noticed is businesses posting a video on TikTok, then recording their TikTok video and posting it on Facebook- in other words, the Facebook post is the TikTok interface watching a video. It's an interesting strategy and it works on me- I see the TikTok logo on Facebook and I stop scrolling just to see what it is.
ReplyDeleteAlso, you make a great point about using age demographics to choose a platform but also combining those with other factors- the 18-24 crowd on Instagram will respond to content differently than the 18-24 TikTok crowd. Plus you have to factor in the kinds of content you'll need to create- posting an engaging photo on Instagram is less work than creating a video on TikTok.
If you can only be on one, it pays to be on what makes the most sense for you. While that often may be Facebook, that is not always the case. Many small businesses prefer Instagram or the community boards such as Reddit. They key is that you want to be where your audience is.
ReplyDelete