How Can We Make Social Ad Spend and Content Work Together?
Helena Salles is a Senior Media Strategist at Purple, Rock, Scissors. A version of this post appears on PRPL.rs.
What’s the Problem?
We live in an age of connection. We are able to digitally maintain ties across multiple timezones with the ease of a “friend request” or “like” button. Every day we are assaulted with articles, updates, and news that we need to trudge through to find carefully curated content that we genuinely want to consume. All this before a brand even has an opportunity to share their offering — how does a brand stand a chance to be noticed?
We are asked time and again: How do we tackle social? How do we grow our followers, or get them to engage with our content? How do we generate value off media that are asking us to invest not only resources, but money?
Is there a solution?
Having followers is important. Without awareness, a brand could have an excellent idea that never gains traction. However, simply having followers isn’t enough — it’s the type of followers that matter. Spending money to grow followers when you want to ramp up a campaign is important. “If we spend it, they will come.” But more importantly, how do we make them stay, and engage, and share?
Understanding the psychology behind social behaviors is a good starting point. What are the dynamics of being online in the first place? Usually we see two core reasons: to consume or to share content.
There is so much information out on the web that it’s nearly impossible to consume everything you’d like on a daily basis. Every minute, your brain needs to carefully curate what content it chooses to take in; it’s lambasted with hundreds of pieces of information and at one point, you hit a saturation point of what information you can take in, let alone retain. How does your brain decide what it wants to focus on? These are micro-decisions your brain has to make at every moment.
What can we do?
So how can a brand that’s new to the game enter into a consumer’s over-saturated universe? More importantly, how can a brand not only enter that universe, but motivate a consumer to engage and share it with their friends?
There are multiple reasons why a user will share information, but we’ll focus on three:
- to look smarter (and begin a conversation)
- to look good (and make someone laugh)
- to save it for personal use later
How do we build a lasting connection with our audience?
STEP 1 — WHY ARE YOU ON SOCIAL MEDIA?
Your social channel should have purpose. There are two main content types when it comes to brands on social media: awareness and lead generation.
Why do you have social in the first place? Do you want a place where your brand can interact with consumers? Do you want a place that can direct them to purchase your product? Do you simply want to gain brand awareness across social media? Each one has a unique goal, and the content on the channel should reflect that.
Awareness:
If you are trying to grow awareness of your brand, then your content needs to be punchy enough to break through the clutter of the internet and grab someone’s attention. Not only for that moment, but to stay top of mind. You should grow the relationship and aim to keep the audience around for a while.
This content should be funny, or awe inspiring, or set them up to look good in front of their followers if they share it. The content could be a genuine, or heartfelt. It should start conversations…even if it’s controversial.
Lead Generation:
If you are looking to solely sell items and push inventory, leveraging your social channel may not be the right medium for it, particularly if they need to leave to complete the purchase. However, there are times when you can take advantage of your owned social content for lead generation:
- Provide one-of-a-kind or first-to-market opportunities to those who are loyal followers
- Announce new releases and release dates
Both of these are ways to make your audience feel special, and give value to your channel.
If you are looking for hard ROI and sales, it is best recommended to look at SEM or marketplace ads on Facebook. Social is a soft return, which carefully develops brand loyalty.
Step 2 — Plant those seeds
GET YOURSELF SOME FOLLOWERS!
If you need followers, you first need to grow your base. Accumulating followers that were organically attracted to your brand means you’ll have higher engagement. It has been noted that a higher engagement impacts the sharing algorithm on a channel such as Facebook; the higher the engagement, the more likely it is that a friend of a follower will organically see that engagement on their wall.
However, sometimes you don’t have months, or years, to slowly grow your followers. In this case, investing money to carefully build a follower campaign may pay off in the long run. You can’t simply throw money and expect them to act. These new followers need to know why they’re there, and why they should come back.
Step 3 — Water Your Plant
NOURISH YOUR FOLLOWERS WITH GOOD CONTENT.
It doesn’t matter how many followers you may have organically earned or purchased, consistently strong content over a long period of time is the best way to maintain your audience. While sponsored posts will help amplify visibility and interaction, having content that matters to your audience will cause them to genuinely want to be the first to know when you post next. Money can only go so far, and it may earn you visibility, but in order to truly gain traction you need to have relevant content that will inspire your audience to share it beyond the limits of your brand. You should understand your audience, and you should pay attention to the types of content that best instigate that kind of engagement.
Money can only go so far, and it may earn you visibility, but in order to truly gain traction you need to have relevant content that will inspire your audience to share it beyond the limits of your brand.
Step 4 — Watch It Grow
KEEP ’EM COMING BACK FOR MORE!
At the end of the day, an audience that is excited about what content you’re putting out next is the goal. It could be a new video, an announcement for a new line, or simply a photo. All followers are not created equal, and you want to make sure that you are not only creating value for all your followers, but also nurturing that relationship and starting a conversation. Social media allows people to voice their opinions and share their thoughts. It’s a forum, and when a brand gains a follower, they should understand that they could lose them at any time.
What does this all mean?
Just as you can’t outrun a bad diet, you can’t outbid bad content. Some investment in sponsored posts or growing a follower base can be a good start, but investing in understanding your social audience, providing consistent high-quality content, and managing that audience so they are engaged with your brand is far more valuable and cost efficient, even though the ROI may not always be as easy to measure.
Let’s talk.
What are your biggest challenges with fostering content engagement or balancing paid and organic growth on social? Or maybe, you’ve already figured it out! Comment below to share your thoughts!
