Diversity + Ownership = Better Engagement
Like a Bugatti Veyron (or a Pagani Huayra, if that’s more your thing), everything moves at breakneck speed these days: the internet, content serving, social media trends and consumer attention spans. For that reason, brands must now provide a truly captivating social experience that maximizes the short amount of time that the consumer actually focuses on the message. Yet, many brands still deliver quantity over quality, hoping that a barrage of one-way messages and imagery will occasionally (or eventually) spur users to answer their call to action.
Let’s use one of the biggest pages on Facebook as an example. Converse posts dozens of pictures of their various shoes to Facebook, as well as the occasional music video from their “Converse Rubber Tracks” series. Most of this content is posted to the page without any call to action, resulting in a very low amount of engagement; some posts have as few as 50 “likes.” Their most active posts garner upwards of 30,000 “likes,” but these numbers only appear spectacular until you take into account the size of their Facebook audience, which totals over 33 million unique users. By simply mass-posting content without any engaging qualities, Converse is not earning nearly as many actions (likes, shares, comments) as they could be. It’s essentially a one-way conversation.
There is an alternative strategy built on two main elements:
- Take a step beyond run-of-the-mill social media content. Brand managers now have dozens of tools at their disposal to help them get away from simple Tweets and Facebook updates. Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest – these are just a few of the big platforms that have solidified themselves as viable weapons in an effective social media arsenal. Innovative, clever use of these platforms can make a campaign a success, just as focusing solely on Facebook can return less-than-desirable results.
- Provide the user a feeling of control over your brand. Take a recent project we worked on with Moto Guzzi, for example. A portion of the site is dedicated to using specific hashtags to aggregate pictures posted to various social platforms, such as Instagram or Twitter. Thanks to mobile technology, consumers have an entire world to work with – literally. This allows users to use any background they want to frame their motorcycle – and the brand – in new and creative ways. Additionally, this type of user-populated campaign has an authentic feel and provides consumers something they’re all interested in: a feeling of “control” over the brand image.
By offering innovative uses of social platforms and user input simultaneously, brands provide a social experience that can captivate a user despite their short attention span. The bonus? They work beautifully in tandem. Matchbox Twenty recently employed the two together to jump-start social conversation.
The next time you’re planning a major social content campaign, consider if your plan goes above and beyond the norm and lets users claim some ownership. That’s where you’ll find the engagement you’re looking for.
Photo courtesy of Counse on Flickr.
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Tagged campaigns, consumer, content, engagement, innovation, ownership, pr, public relations, social media
