Introduction
The Customer Insight Group (2018) states that a social media campaign is when a company promote their brand on one or more of their social media channels, with the aim of achieving measurable results. Over the years, social media marketing has significantly increased, influenced by research findings. For example (Foux,2006) highlights that consumers perceive social media marketing to be more authentic compared to traditional marketing techniques. This has led to 78% of businesses investing in their social media teams (Quigley,2018).
How to effectively select a channel for your campaign
With numerous social media channels to select from (eg. Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Snapchat, etc) identifying the right platform to promote your brand on can often be difficult. However, research has been undertaken to help simplify the process for marketers by identifying the most effective channels as well as pinpointing the demographics that favour those channels.
As illustrated in Figure 1 below, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube were ranked as the three most popular social media channels in 2017 (DreamGrow,2017). In addition, Hicks (2018) highlights that in order for brands to maximise their social media marketing potential they must be able to cater to their target markets’ marketing preferences, achieved by selecting an effective social media channel to feature the campaign on.
Furthermore, a social media analytics company conducted this research and discovered that marketing campaigns featured on Facebook would be accessible and suitable for all age groups (see Figure 2 below). However, Instagram would be most effective for campaigns that want to target females aged between 18-29 (see Figure 3 below) (Sprout Special, 2016). Furthermore, a recent survey found that the most effective marketing channel for young consumers is Snapchat, the survey concluded that over 83% of 12-17 individuals engaged with the platform regularly and effectively.
Interested to read more into Sprout Special’s research findings on social media demographics?…..click here
Figure 1: Top 15 Most Popular Social Media channels in 2017
Figure 2: Facebook demographics
Figure 3: Instagram demographics
Why selecting an influencer is a crucial factor that can affect the performance of the campaign?
The use of influencers in social media campaigns has increased tremendously over the years, with 84% of marketers finding it an effective method when implanted into their social marketing practices (Olenski, 2017).
The purpose of using an influencer is to remove the initial barrier of ‘doubt’ between consumer and the brand, as a credible influencer would have established a sense of ‘trust’ between themselves and their followers.This is achieved by releasing honest content on product reviews and recommendations. Additionally, de Vries et al (2012) highlights that using an influencer can also increase the acceptance of the brands’ communicated message to the targeted audience. Thus emphasising on why selecting the ‘right’ influence is important
To help simplify the process of selecting the perfect influencer for your brand, Hamann (2014) lists five tips:
1) Relevance- research the blogger, is the content aligned with the brand image?
2) Engagement- does the blogger engage with the followers? i.e. responds to enquires
3) Reach- Does the message grasp an adequate amount of followers?
4) Frequency- How frequently do they blog?
5) Authenticity- is the content compelling and engaging?
Click here to read more on how to select the right influencer
Benefits of social media campaigns
DeMers (2014) simplifies 3 key benefits that brands can achieve from implementing social media campaigns into their pre-existing marketing strategy:
1) Increased brand awareness- social media channels can be used to increase brand visibility by conversing with your current and potential customers about the company and the products/ services offered.
2) Increased inbound traffic- social media channels allow for brands to interact and acquire with consumers other than ones familiar with your business.
3) A decrease in marketing costs- according to research only dedicating 6 hours a week to your social media platforms is a sufficient amount of generating traffic and engagement.
Examples of companies to take notes from that have succeeded with their social media campaigns:
1) Mr Clean: Super Bowl Ad and Valentine’s campaign- generated over 17 million views on YouTube, and over 11,700 mentions in a minute on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
2) Taco Bell Cinco de Mayo Snapchat Filter: The Snapchat lens was viewed more than 224 million times a day
3) Dead pool-:received over 200 million impressions on Snapchat
Click here to read more about these companies’ marketing campaigns and what led them to success
Risks involved in social media campaigns
1) The authenticity of influencers- The growth of the ‘influencer industry’ has made it a very prosperous industry to be in, this has led to individuals falsely identifying themselves as ‘credible influencer’ through buying their followers. As a result, making it difficult for brands to identify trustworthy influencers (Zatat,2017). The extent to why this is a crucial factor is emphasised by De Veirman et al (2017) as they discuss the image of the influencer (positive or negative) is often passed onto the brand.
2)The backlash of sponsored content- Due to the recent regulations, it is mandatory for influencers to include the following hashtags on sponsored content (#ad, #spon or #paid). However, this has led to 30% of consumers finding posts featured with these hashtags to be ‘inauthentic’ (Bockholt, 2017).
Conclusion
To conclude, it is clear that social media campaigns can be an effective marketing strategy, as the benefits outweigh the risks. However, as discussed marketers’ must remember the success of their campaign heavily relies on identifying the right influencer. This can be easily achieved through thorough research, it might be time-consuming but will save the brand money and reputational damage in the long run. Likewise, understanding your demographics and their marketing preferences will allow for your brand to select the most appropriate channel to campaign on and will save the company money and time.
Reference
Bockholt, S. (2017) ‘The Pros and Cons of Influencer Marketing’, TheCore, 3rd March 2017 [online] available at < https://www.dma-solutions.com/thecoreblog/the-pros-and-cons-of-influencer-marketing > accessed 13th February 2018
DeMers, J.(2014) ‘The Top 10 Benefits Of Social Media Marketing’, Forbes, 11th August 2014 [online] available at <https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2014/08/11/the-top-10-benefits-of-social-media-marketing/#7b19d7481f80 > accessed 13th February 2018
De Veirman, M., Cauberghe, V. and Hudders, L. (2017) Marketing through Instagram influencers: the impact of number of followers and product divergence on brand attitude. International Journal of Advertising, Vol 36, No 5, p 798-828
De Vries, L., Gensler, S. and Leeflang, P.S. (2012) Popularity of brand posts on brand fan pages: An investigation of the effects of social media marketing. Journal of interactive marketing, No 26, Vol 2, pp 83-91
DreamGrow (2017) cited in Kallas, P. (2018) ‘ Top 15 Most Popular Social Networking Sites and Apps’, DreamGrow,11th February 2018 [online] available at < https://www.dreamgrow.com/top-15-most-popular-social-networking-sites/> accessed 13th February 2018
Foux, G. (2006) cited in Mangold, W.G. and Faulds, D.J. (2009) Social media: The new hybrid element of the promotion mix. Business horizons, Vol 52, No 4, p 357-365
Hamann, H. (2014) ‘5 Tips for Finding the Right Social Influencers for Your Brand’, Covince&CovertBlog, 11th December 2014 [online] available at < http://www.convinceandconvert.com/digital-marketing/5-tips-for-finding-the-right-social-influencers-for-your-brand/ > accessed 13th February 2018
Hicks, K. (2018) ‘How Understanding Different Social Media Audience Demographics Improves Marketing’, Effective Speed, 6th November [online] available at < http://www.effectivespend.com/understanding-the-audience-of-each-social-media-platform/ > accessed 12th February 2018
Olenski, S. (2017) ‘The Importance Of Influencer Marketing For B2B Marketers’, Forbes, 1oth August 2017 [online] available at < https://www.forbes.com/sites/steveolenski/2017/08/10/the-importance-of-influencer-marketing-for-b2b-marketers/#3bd280c14871 > accessed 14th February 2018
Sprout Special (2016) cited in York, A. (2017) ‘ Social Media Demographics to Inform a Better Segmentation Strategy’, Sprout Special, 6th March 2017 [online] available at <https://sproutsocial.com/insights/new-social-media-demographics/ > accessed 12th February 2018
The Customer Insight Group (2018) ‘How Do You Define a Social Media Campaign?’ [online] available at <https://www.customerinsightgroup.com/marketinglibrary/social-media-marketing/what-is-a-social-media-marketing-campaign > accessed 13th February 2018
Quigley, A. (2018) ‘5 Successful Social Media Campaigns You Can Learn From’, Trends& Insights [online] available at <https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/blog/5-successful-social-media-campaigns-you-can-learn-from > accessed 12th February 2018
Zatat, N. (2017) “Social media experiment has revealed how simple it is to create a fake Instagram account and make money from them”, The Independent, 11th August 2017 [online] available at < http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/social-media-experiment-fake-instagram-accounts-make-money-influencer-star-blogger-mediakix-a7887836.html > accessed 13th February 2018