Showing posts with label Advertising Campaigns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Advertising Campaigns. Show all posts

Friday, April 25, 2025

YOUR Offline Business Social Media?


Social Media has become a worldwide phenomenon. The growth in usage statistics is staggering across the numerous platforms that make up this online world. In 2022 alone the number of social media users rose by 176 million bringing the total number of active social media users to 2.3 billion..



Social Media for Offline Businesses

Despite these astonishing statistics, the big question still remains. Does Social Media Belong in Your Business Plan?

The starting point for answering the question “Does social media belong in your business plan?” is the understanding that a business plan is a living, breathing, ever-changing document. It is no secret that too many business owners of small to medium size businesses either don’t develop a business plan at all or if they do, they don’t revisit it periodically to keep it fresh and relevant.


While social media has existed for some time now, its use for business is a rather recent development. This has come about as a result of its increasing acceptance by the population in general, businesses finding ways to capitalize on it, larger businesses dedicating resources to it and the social media platforms offering more business-oriented capabilities.



Those business owners that are keeping their plans current are likely to already have included it as a consideration. For others, this new technology may force them to dust off their current business plan and take a fresh look from a new perspective.

So how should you incorporate social media into your business plan?

To answer that question, let’s examine some of the key elements of a business plan.


Market Analysis

Has social media had an impact on the specific industry related to your business?

For example, if you own a restaurant you need to know whether any of these platforms could help you grow your business. In this case, two immediately come to mind - Yelp and Foursquare.

It would be important to be proactive with the use of these platforms in your business planning.



You must keep in mind that tech is not just a ‘young man’s’ game anymore. We’ve about reached that point where you’re no longer surprised to see a grandma on a smartphone.

This means no matter your demographic, they are tech-savvy. It’s why AARP has such a large social media presence. Everyone is online.

Competitive Analysis

In this section of your business plan have you analyzed how your competitors are using social media platforms? For example, do they have a business page on Facebook? Do they use Facebook ads?

Along these same lines, you need to consider how investing in these platforms can help you with your competitive differentiation. How can you use them to make your business stand out from the rest?

It’s a simple way of assessing your needs. Look at other similar businesses and see if they are getting good results from social media. Business can be very collaborative so even if it’s not apparent how good the company’s ROI is, they may happily share it with you. Just please contribute something in return.




Organization and Management

The use of these technologies requires resources. Consideration needs to be given to whether these will be internal or external.

In addition, social media can provide an effective platform for managing customer service, including issues. It has provided new methods for people to share their opinions about a business and its service.

It is important to follow these developments and pay attention to whether your customers are providing information to their online friends about your business.

Social media also keeps people from asking the same question over and over again. A simple tweet from your company’s social media account may be enough to quell the question of thousands of customers.

Now that’s a good ROI, wouldn’t you agree?




Marketing and Sales

This is a crucial area for those that decide to dedicate time, energy and money to the use of social media. A focused strategy is critical to the success or you may spend thousands of dollars with little return to show for it.

Consistent messages, attracting people to your products and converting them to customers requires proper business planning for successful execution.

It seems like nearly all sales at least start online. Nearly all of us go online before going in-store. Even just to check the general prices on Amazon. With that said, social media ties in nicely. Market and sell to your customers before they go to anyone else.

Financial

Unfortunately, most owners of small to medium size businesses spend money on online services such as a website that is never going to give them a return on their investment because the site is not likely to be found among the millions of websites that exist today. However, these new platforms can provide very cost effective alternatives for promoting your business.




New data released by email marketing software provider Yesmail shows that 91 percent of retail brands use two or more social media channels.

Final Thoughts

In summary, the growth of social media indicates that it is here to stay. That doesn’t mean that every platform will survive, however. It is important to periodically review your business plan to ensure that your business is taking advantage of the growth opportunities that social media has to offer.

This doesn’t mean you need to feel responsible for managing these social media campaigns. There are lots of young people who are eager to prove themselves and all you have to do is give them the keys, a modest budget, and watch the magic.

Okay, well, that’s not all there is to do. But those are ingredients that can lead to big results.

So should your business have a social media presence? Probably. No matter who your target demographic. Even if your demographic is children in Africa. Social media is still useful for letting everyone know what your company is doing for those children. Social media is about giving your company a voice. It’s not about pushing products, singing your praises, or posting funny cat meme’s on Friday’s.

Guest Authored By William Lipovsky. William owns the personal finance website First Quarter Finance. His most embarrassing moment was telling a Microsoft executive, "I'll just Google it." Follow William on Twitter.




So should your business have a social media presence?

Probably. No matter who your target demographic.

Even if your demographic is children in Africa.

Social media is still useful for letting everyone know what your company is doing for those children.

Social media is about giving your company a voice. It’s not about pushing products, singing your praises, or posting funny cat meme’s on Friday’s.

Be there for those you care about..


    • Authored by:
      Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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    Saturday, March 15, 2025

    YOUR "Innovative" Social Media Advertising?


    The social media marketing field is crowded with businesses and personal brands trying to gain visibility; in fact, Jayson DeMer's "What Works in Online Marketing" survey found that 95 percent of marketers are planning to either increase their social media marketing budgets or keep them the same..

    With that many competitors in the field, your campaign needs to be innovative if it's going to survive - but what exactly makes a campaign "innovative," and how can you achieve it?



    Why Innovation Is Important?

    First, let's take a look at why innovation is important.

    Differentiation

    You need to differentiate your brand from those of your competitors if you're going to stand out. Your prospective followers have dozens of businesses to choose from, and if your posts look the same as everyone else's, you're going to blend into the background as meaningless white noise. Doing something innovative instantly makes you stand out, and sometimes, that extra visibility is all it takes to win a follower's loyalty.

    Novelty

    When you do something innovative, you're also presenting your followers with something novel - something they've never seen before. This interests most people, and makes you more memorable at the same time.

    Leadership

    If you try something for the first time, even if you fail, you'll be seen as a leader in the industry for attempting it. People have a deep respect for pioneers and innovators, so any experiments you conduct will likely be met with interest and appreciation.

    Key Qualities

    At this point, I'd like to outline what I see as the three general qualities that define an innovative social media marketing campaign:



    A Unique Voice

    First, you need a unique brand voice, or at least a unique direction. Your voice should be a culmination of your values as a business, your target audience, and a juxtaposition of your business with competing businesses. Ideally, your voice will be appealing to your customers, different from those of your competitors, and representative of your brand’s personality. Sometimes, a tone is all it takes to differentiate content as belonging to one brand over another.

    A Surprise

    You can achieve novelty by giving your followers a surprise - and therefore triggering cognitive processes linked to memory. Surprises, by definition, deviate from the norm, making them innovative, and you can present them in a number of different ways. You might, for example, surprise your followers by giving your video a twist ending, or by shocking them with a statistic you recently found in your original research. You could also surprise them by posting something your industry does't usually like to talk about.

    An Unmatched Framework

    Innovation in social media is also usually marked by a defiance of traditional formatting. That may include shorter or longer posts than usual, a more or less formal way of phrasing things, or the inclusion of a content type that isn't usually posted.



    Driving Innovation

    So how can you inspire more innovation in your own social media campaigns? It's tough, if not impossible, to force creativity to happen, but you can use these strategies to come up with more innovative thoughts and ideas:

    Remove Yourself From The Game

    I frequently encourage entrepreneurs and marketers to step up their social media game by studying the actions of others, taking inspiration and learning by example. Watching how your competitors post (and how their followers respond), for example, can teach you what types of content do and don't work in your industry. However, if you want to be a true innovator, it may be better to remove yourself from the game entirely. Take a social media break, or spend more time on different platforms, watching different brands than you're used to. Get out of the routine.

    Cross-Reference

    You can also innovate by taking inspiration from other areas. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr are all very different social media platforms, with very different ways to post and interact, but all of them have thriving fan bases. Drawing formatting or content inspiration from one platform and hybridizing it with formatting and archetypes from another may be a useful way to come up with something novel for your fans.



    Break Some Rules

    There are some informal "rules" for how to post and what to post on different platforms, and for the most part, they work well. However, if you want to distinguish yourself, you're going to have to be okay with breaking some of them.

    Focus On An Emotion

    One of the most important factors for viral content is the ability to strike an emotional chord with readers. You can stand out as a thought leader and innovator simply by evoking the right emotion, in the right way, and at the right time. You can do this, and surprise your readers at the same time, by stirring up controversy, such as by taking a strong stance or taking issue with one of your competitors.


    Avoid Committee Approaches

    Finally, try to avoid the "design by committee" approach to social media management. Multiple voices tend to cancel each other out and produce a vanilla, predictable finished product. Instead, designate one person to be in charge of posting, and allow their voice to stand out through the brand.


    Obviously, being weird or different isn't automatically going to make your campaign a success. Doing something truly innovative is a risk, albeit one that typically pays off over the long term. In addition to your most innovative, groundbreaking content, I encourage you to create a strong foundation with more predictably successful content, including blog posts, whitepapers, and interactions with your most loyal followers.

    Over time, you'll develop a reputation as a thought leader without alienating the rest of your fan base, and your social media campaign will undoubtedly benefit.

    Guest Authored By Jayson DeMers. Jayson is Founder and CEO of AudienceBloom. He "de-mystifys SEO and online marketing for business owners." Jayson graduated from the University of Washington in 2008 with a degree in Business Administration (Marketing), and immediately entered the professional online marketing world. He founded AudienceBloom in April 2010, and has since become a columnist for Forbes, Search Engine Journal, Search Engine Watch, and Huffington Post. Jayson guest lectures for marketing classes at the University of Washington, and currently resides in Seattle, WA. Follow Jayson on X.





    Obviously, being weird or different isn't automatically going to make your campaign a success.

    Doing something truly innovative is a risk, albeit one that typically pays off over the long term.

    In addition to your most innovative, groundbreaking content, I encourage you to create a strong foundation with more predictably successful content, including blog posts, whitepapers, and interactions with your most loyal followers.."

    • Post Crafted by Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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    Saturday, March 8, 2025

    What Other Peoples Advertising Can Teach YOU?


    What A Creative Can Teach You About Advertising Your Small Business..

    There’s an old adage that all publicity is good publicity and it rings true with any new business.



    An entrepreneur can pour heart and soul into their new product or service, but without market awareness of it, the business dies before its first breath.

    One of the most essential ways to build such awareness is through advertising. Both large corporations and the micro-entrepreneurs I have written about in Forbes know the importance of promoting their businesses and scaling their services.

    Most people are familiar with the big-name advertising campaigns: from soft drink brand names on scoreboards to insurance companies sponsoring prime time TV shows. What these campaigns aim to do is form a connection with consumers by making their products and services appear relatable to the activities and experiences in the consumer’s life. A successful campaign makes a brand memorable, so that the next time someone makes a purchasing decision, they remember that particular brand.



    But people tend to be much less familiar with how small businesses build brand recognition.

    Take a look at newspaper ads, social media posts, and small-time sponsorships, and you’ll find many less-known brands trying to make a name for themselves. So, how can small business owners, start-ups and budding entrepreneurs benefit from an advertising program? And how can they access what to many may seem a luxury?

    Vahbiz Engineer is a senior copywriter at a top New York marketing and communications agency. Originally from India, Vahbiz knows the value of translating across cultures, getting out of your comfort zone, and pushing boundaries. After ten plus years in the industry, she has seen her fair share of hits no matter the budget size. Vahbiz agreed to share her top five tips for entrepreneurs looking to incorporate advertising strategies into their work.



    Tip 1: Be Resourceful

    Creativity has nothing to do with size of your budget or team. As Vahbiz has seen with many of her nonprofit clients, being creative with where you spend what few resources you have is the key to success. Take the time to think about what you have and how to use it best to grab headlines.

    GoPro, the now famous camera and content company was finally able to find its footing in the market when their videos went viral—an almost free advertising campaign with the power to captivate a generation of consumers. The concept was simple: adventurers and athletes alike used GoPro cameras to film their sports from a perspective most viewers never dreamed of getting. They uploaded the movies on sites like YouTube, and suddenly GoPro videos went viral and sales shot through the roof. By giving away cameras and selectively sponsoring a few sporting events, GoPro was able to feed this cycle until it turned a profit.



    Tip 2: Be Credible

    A message is only as believable as the person who delivers it, so don’t waste time promoting your business if you don’t have the credibility to back it up. Join Facebook groups or Reddit threads on your area of expertise. Once you are there, don’t promote your product. Instead, listen to the issues and problems coming out of the market, help design solutions, and participate in the community.

    While Spotify certainly isn’t an underground brand, they do know how to successfully participate and win over the critical audience on Reddit. In 2014, they were named the Community Brand of the Year. How? By asking Redditors for the songs that have meant the most to big moments in their lives as well as those go-to songs for every circumstance. The community responded with 10,000+ comments and Spotify was able to start a new cultural conversation, and it had very little to do with what they were selling.



    Tip 3: Make Your message ‘Human’

    With fewer resources, the stickiness of your message becomes even more important. Vahbiz notes that “the more ‘human’ your message is, the greater power it has to speak to many markets and across demographics. It needs to appeal to instinct, it needs to move people, make them feel something, whether it be empathy, happiness or invoke laughter. If you reach that inner humanity of people and appeal to it, you can touch many.”

    She recalls working on a particularly challenging project with a global liquor company. Her client wanted a simple campaign that could be heard and felt around the world. After months of ideating, they finally landed on a message that could be scaled widely and later won some of the most prestigious recognition in advertising for it. How? By avoiding excess and complexity, and sticking instead to those emotions that cross cultures.



    Tip 4: Be Authentic

    Presumably, you started your business because you experienced a need that you knew others were experiencing as well. This is one of the most important ways you can relate to your target market, so channel this unique position when communicating with your future clients.

    When James Dyson launched his famous vacuum cleaner in 1987, people balked at its $2,000 price-tag, but as Dyson took the international stage over the next ten years to explain why his product was superior—and that he had created it in response to his own frustrations with vacuum bags—the product caught on and today accounts for more than £2.5 billion in revenue.

    By lending his own voice and message to his brand, Dyson was able to appeal to his market and showcase his own expertise.



    Tip 5: Bet On The Right Place-Time-Message Trifecta

    Vahbiz advises entrepreneurs to “take a look at what’s happening around them, in culture, in society, in the industry and to find a place in those conversations. Then, when the time is right to strike with their powerful message which becomes relevant.” For example, a smart entrepreneur targeting women may respond to the #MeToo movement in their message.

    A few years ago, before the Serial podcast became a huge hit on NPR, an up-and-coming email-marketing brand signed on to sponsor their season. That brand, MailChimp, took a chance on something they thought appealed to the same kind of people that use their product, and won by a landslide. As the podcast became a booming success—almost a cultural movement in and of itself—MailChimp’s success also rose.

    Guest Authored By Anuja Khemka. Anuja writes about entrepreneurs converting obstacles into opportunities. She is a philanthropy expert, working with nonprofits, corporations, high net-worth individuals to maximize their impact. she has spent over a decade in the corporate sector, primarily at Goldman Sachs and the JPMorgan Chase Foundation. Her philanthropic work has been featured in New York Times, Stanford Social Innovation Review and Huffington Post. Follow Anuja on Twitter.




    "The power of advertising for your business cannot be underestimated. But remember, you don’t need to break the bank to get there.

    Stick to these simple tips to be resourceful with your message and spread the word about your unique value.." -Anuja Khemka



      • Authored by:
        Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBr@nd.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Scottsdale, AZ where I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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      Friday, July 14, 2017

      Powerful Social Media Success Metrics?


      One of the most exciting aspects of digital and social media marketing is also one of the most challenging, since it's always changing..


      Platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter constantly release new features, policy changes and algorithm updates that influence the way we approach our campaign tactics. The key to optimizing your social media performance is data.

      Measuring your results from these campaigns is always a top priority. The main challenge is figuring out which metrics are most important and how to apply them. In other words, it's not just as simple as looking at "likes." Here are the metrics we deem most important for our clients based on campaign type for both organic, unpaid social media efforts and paid ad campaigns.

      Organic Campaigns

      Link clicks: In Facebook Insights, you can see overall clicks on your posts, but you can also break it down further to see specific link clicks. Link clicks are the most important, because they show the most relevant form of engagement. This tells you your audience is interested enough to learn more, and if they're on your own site, you can track their journey from there.



      A client of ours once wished to boost a Facebook post (an uploaded photo with a link in the text above) for clicks. Initially, he was not pleased since the post received a high number of clicks but a low number of conversions on his site. It turned out that he was looking at total clicks and not link clicks, which required a different evaluation. Since total clicks were so much higher than link clicks, we were able to attribute a significant amount of page "likes" to that particular post. The difference helps you to attribute your successes (and failures) more efficiently.

      Reach versus impressions: Reach is the number of people who see a post, while impressions are the number of times the ad was seen. For example, if an ad was shown to the same person twice, it would count as one reach and two impressions. If your campaign goal is to get your ad in front of a specific number of people or get the word out to as many people as possible, then reach would be the appropriate metric to look at.

      If your goal is to have your ad shown a specific number of times to your audience to increase brand awareness, then impressions would be a suitable metric to look at. It all depends on what your goal is.



      Platform engagement: Platform engagement here means likes, retweets, shares, comments, follows, etc., and while probably overrated in terms of its importance for driving ROI, it is helpful for appearance's sake in terms of interesting content. Though it's less reliable than link clicks, it can help increase reach and impressions when people interact with your content. For example, if you do work for a networking business where social media brand optics are important to its operations, Facebook reactions become legitimate metrics to keep track of in your campaign.

      Paid Ads

      Conversions: Whether it's a form-fill, a sign-up or an e-commerce buy, you must have a conversion goal in mind when creating ads. This provides a direct ROI for your efforts, which is crucial. Our first step when taking over a client's Facebook is installing the base pixel on their website, and then setting up the conversion event code that is relevant to them.

      By using the pixel to track the journey from the Facebook sponsored post all the way to the purchase screen on their site, we can track people's digital paths.



      Sometimes it's even simpler than installing a pixel code. On LinkedIn, you can use lead generation forms as the goal of your sponsored content campaign, and interested individuals can have a seamless path to contacting your business and becoming a lead. Whether it's ticket sales or lead forms, paid social media campaigns should provide ROI in a trackable way.

      Button clicks: On Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram ads, there is oftentimes a call-to-action button, like "Contact Us," "Learn More," "Buy Now" etc. These are the best types of clicks to attain because they show the most direct intent.

      In our experience, tracking button clicks is best in Facebook Ads Manager and Instagram for a specific B2B client of ours. Due to its high cost of conversion, we couldn't just use conversions as a metric. We first looked at just link clicks, and they were even across the board. We then looked at button clicks and saw that one ad had far more than others.

      This told us that more people were expressing explicit intent to convert, which was effective because the ad with the most button clicks had the most conversions when the campaign ended.



      Relevance score: The relevancy score ranges from 1-10 (10 being the highest) and is the best way to see the bang-for-your-buck about how the ad is performing in the Facebook algorithm. It lets you know how effective the pairing of your creative is with your audience and can assist you with campaign optimization.

      To test this system, we set up a campaign with three different ad sets, each with identical creatives but with different target audiences. This allowed us to gain insights into which audience was the most appropriate for our campaign goal based on the relevancy score each ad set received. We then targeted the audience that had the highest relevancy score and tested different creatives against each other to achieve the highest reach. There's no use speculating about what audience, creative or strategy might work best when you can just check the numbers.

      Social media isn't just some vague, unmeasurable, slight benefit to your business. There are all sorts of metrics to use, and that data can be leveraged to ensure improvement, optimization and overall effectiveness of campaigns.

      Guest Authored By Bob McKay. Bob is the the president and owner at McKay Advertising & Activation, digital media masters that help you put strategy first. Follow Bob on Twitter.





      “Social media isn't just some vague, unmeasurable, slight benefit to your business.

      There are all sorts of metrics to use, and that data can be leveraged to ensure improvement, optimization and overall effectiveness of campaigns..”


        • Authored by:
          Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)
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        Location: Loveland, CO 80538, USA
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