How to crush it with your social media, online and mobile marketing in 2018
Key words for 2018: video, mobile, creators, branded video, value-laden content, trends
At the beginning of 2017, influencer marketing was the hot topic for brand content strategies — but those days are far behind us now.
Last year saw many developments in the way of tools and demographics to better target potential customers and analytics models to accurately measure the results of an influencer marketing campaign.
However, as viewers become increasingly weary of influencer content and start to tune out of so-called ‘sponsored ads’ on popular platforms including YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat just like advertisements on regular media, marketers need to shift their focus for 2018 to stay ahead of the curve and continue maximizing their return on investment on these channels.
Instead 2018 is going to be the year of the creator and branded videos.
Mobile-friendly videos and calls to action
Notice it’s videos and not simply content that’s going to make a big impression in the next 12 months.
Video, and especially those watched on mobile devices, exploded in the last couple of years. In 2017 more than half of all social media videos were viewed on mobile devices and the trend is not slowing down anytime soon.
And as far as video goes, some one third of our online activity last year was spent watching videos while 45% of people watched more than an hour of Facebook or YouTube videos a week. Utilizing this medium in 2018 is essential for any marketer looking to engage their target customers for both brand presence and sales or installs.
More than ever in 2018 calls to action on social media marketing videos need to take the customers to a mobile optimized landing page and preferably to an app to continue the customer journey as seamlessly as possible and not lose potential sales along the way — native content beginning to end.
Creators vs influencers and audience-centric content
Social media creators who have gained their followings by being genuine with their audience and providing videos of consistent value to their subscribers will be the hottest commodity this year to put across your marketing messages.
Influencers only doing sponsored ads and standard product placements are less interesting for your target customers than true creators who incorporate the messages in their own funny, entertaining or helpful way so the collaboration does not come off as an advert but valuable content in its own right.
The audience is going to be at the centre of online marketing this year, there’s enough choice now available of creators to follow and videos to watch that if you’re not putting out content they love, it’s not going to get the results you plan.
Branded videos
But how do you do this? The answer is through branded videos. That is, not splashing your brand message across the content but taking a subtler approach with it. Let the audience know you collaborated with the creator on the content, that you helped facilitate this video that your target customers are watching and enjoying but not in a way that interferes with it.
Include your call to action, preferably near the start to get the most views, but trust your creator with the creative decisions and the audience to know what to do if they are interested in your app or product.
In an ideal world, collaborating on a series with a creator with only a “brought to you by brand x” would be an efficient and effective marketing campaign for 2018.
For example, at the end of last year Staples, a supplier of office furniture and equipment, collaborated with interior designer and DIY creator couple Mr. Kate to make this series called ‘Office Goals on the Road’.
Staples is mentioned near the beginning of the episodes and shopping for the offices is done through Staples too, however, the creative part of the collaboration is left to the creator and the end product is in keeping with the theme of their channel so as not to isolate viewers. Episodes of this are getting up to 570k views.
Stay one step ahead of the latest trends
One problem with mobile video marketing in 2017 was the risk of making a flop and not getting the views or results predicted. This risk is being significantly mitigated in 2018 with the prevalence of algorithms to predict up coming trends on social media platforms.
Trending topics usually have mass appeal and get picked up by many creators who stick to the theme but try and make it their own, but the phase is short lived. In 2017 we saw trends such as Slime, 3am and Pancake Art enjoy their moments and brands that were able to capitalise quickly enough on these videos saw the best results.
Some trends are easy to predict as they come around year after year, examples might be Halloween or Back To School. However, to predict a trend that seems to come from nowhere is much harder, especially as marketers need time to carry out creator collaborations.
In 2018, brands who have this intelligence will prevail and the tech enabling this transformation is only getting better and more accurate.
For more information on the latest YouTube trends, check out the Sponsokit website.
