The ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ Social Media for Professional Marketers

The whole of last year has been a busy year for those social media for professional marketers who have opted for marketing their brands and services in the Social Media. Most marketers are on the lookout for new strategies and tactics to make promoting their products or services in the right manner on Social Media. This article covers some of the strategies that can be used for the apt marketing in the Social Media.

1. Social Endorsements and the FTC Rules:

It is known that there is no way you can ignore the guidelines by the FTC. The Federal Trade commission which is an agency in the US enforcing the laws for truth-in-advertising appears to be getting tougher. The message put across by the FTC is that the relationships which are based on material between the endorser and the brand should be disclosed in a clear cut manner. This FTC is more specific with guidance in a detailed manner where social media issues are concerned. In short, FTC is clearly keeping a watch on the marketing activity in social media.

*Disclosure for Sweepstakes and Contests

In case a contest is accompanied by a specific endorsement you are required to adopt the disclosure policy. This is the responsibility of the sponsor of the contest. FTC might scrutinize the specific brand is contest rules are not accompanied with disclosures.

* “Likes” on Facebook

There is no way in which the FTC can find out whether the ‘likes’ on Facebook are genuine or not. The agency is strictly against incentivizing likes. Sellers and buyers of likes from people or non-existent can face enforcement.

* Video Disclosures

You tube is required to have a disclosure at the beginning of a video, which needs to be repeated often during the video. A disclaimer which is put on the details page will not suffice.

2. Video Opportunities on Social Media:

Marketers need to be aware that posting a video content on platforms like Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook can lead to optimization. Live-streaming is on an all time high as this can provide instant details and information. As this helps the people see the human side of a business, tends to be more effective. Periscope is an ideal way to post videos. A business is able to record the happenings in tutorials, office, interviews and anything else that works out creative. This gets delivered immediately. In a world which seems to moving at a breath-taking speed, no one wants to wait.

3. Privacy and Security:

With the recent scandals on the privacy of the users, Social Media is expected to make their privacy and user settings more secure. The users require a communication method which tends to be more secure. This is the reason that social platforms are paying extra attention to the privacy settings. The users, being more at ease, can communicate comfortably on these platforms for their businesses.

4. Marketing via Instant Articles on Facebook:

There has been a new feature launched by Facebook, named ‘instant articles’. This can load articles from any external website directly in Facebook. These articles tend to open instantly which makes the experience an exciting one. For marketers to be able to take the benefit of this, they need to be aware that

* These articles will be available only on mobile devices.

* You need to fill a specific form if you feel your articles are ideal for the ‘instant article’ on Face book.

* For the activation of this Instant article you need to have a specific code to the framework of your website. Word press is a better option as this already has a plug-in to add to the markup of a specific website.

* Facebook intends supporting media assets considered ‘rich’, like images, videos, maps, audio clips, and also slide shows.

* Ads are built in these instant articles which the publishers can control totally.

5. Using Crowd Marketing

This style of marketing is where you tend to connect with influencers who are already interacting with you with your chosen market. This type of marketing is getting directly to the influencers in your niche for getting conversions. This marketing is link building and social optimization with the key influencers. Crowd marketing lets you ramp up your accounts with Sound Cloud, Twitter, Face book and You tube. It is essential to have a fan base which grows. This link building with people can help in social media marketing for each of the platform. Cross promotion becomes convenient as tweeters are able to send out your videos on You tube and Facebook users mention you on Sound Cloud.

6. Social Media Messaging Platforms:

According to global trends messaging is soon going to take over call centers and e-mails and play an important role in e-commerce. Messaging help you to reply in a quick manner to the complaints of your customers. This helps in relationship building and engaging in issues. You need to be aware that messaging makes an immediate impact and also increase inter-personal interactions. This makes a whole lot of difference to the experience of a customer. Messaging can get the desired results if you intend communicating on specific problems faced by a customer and not forward copy-paste messages. This can only spoil the reputation built by your brand.

7. Marketing with Social Media SEO:

Google tends to measure your website’s popularity by the Social Media. It is essential to ensure that the content publishes is of a high quality as we all know that “content is king”. The success of SEO depends largely on the content. You need to ensure that your content is shared on the social media platform as this can connect any brand to a social web considered as ‘wider’. This is letting your message reach to more than thousands of people.  You need to be aware that images can make a difference to the SEO. Make sure your images can put forward the message of a ‘must read’.

8. Mobile Technology with Social Media:

With the mobile technology taking over, it is rare to find someone not using their smart phone for updates on Face book or any other Social Media platform. Going about your routine without connecting to the social medias is almost impossible for most. There are few ways which marketers can ensure that using mobile apps can work to their advantage.

* Create a compelling bio and header image: As these social medias on mobiles work in a ‘columnar’ manner, users tend to see the bio and header images before the content of your company when they visit the profile page. The header image should be relevant and striking and the bio is able to grab the required attention, speaking in a powerful manner about your brand.

* Use content which can be shared, like videos and images: It has been reported that a large percentage of vendors tend to visit a specific site only after seeing the video. Pictures and videos can be an engaging factor for social media sites and mobile apps. The images should be able to provide in-sights of your brand. You can also opt to record the review of different customers of your services or products.

9. “Native” and “Interactive” ads:

Social media is all about connectivity in accordance to the choice of an individual. People tend to connect with brands they can trust. B2B mobile ads should be created in accordance to the intuitive usage and connectivity. Native ads and interactive ads seem to be the apt choice. Interactive ads can convince an individual to be involved and get feedback from those who use it. Marketers are able to use this interaction for analyzing the behavior of the potential customers and solidify the relationships with the customers. Along with tweaking, this can lead to ROI being to the maximum.

Native ads concentrate more on being able to provide the users an experience with the brand. These ads are specifically designed similar to natural content inside the platform which a user is already into.

For the right approach to both the interactive and native ads, you need to

* Create ads on the interactive side which is able to give the user an experience with a specific brand. You need to think of ways which are non-disruptive in which the users can interact with a specific brand.

* Native ads need to be created in a manner in which the user feels them useful and is able to get a seamless experience. This, in other words, is not emphasizing on the ‘sales’ factor but being useful and relevant. It is essential to make use of conventions which are sensible in the social media context.

The above mentioned trends of marketing with Social media are not going to end for a long period of time. It is advisable to adapt these into your marketing strategy to ensure your business can achieve the required success. You need to be aware that social media is going to play an important role in marketing and getting more ‘likes’ on Face book, subscriptions to You tube and followers in Instagram will be important for all types of businesses.

This post was submitted by Manas  KR