Category: Facebook
It is often surprising to see how little creative effort companies put into their Facebook marketing, particularly given the level of noise they make about using the platform.
Creative resources can be scarcer at small businesses without big social media budgets, and Facebook does have a somewhat static format to work with. Yet it needn’t be costly to come up with some great landing page manipulation, and here are some tips that should offer some inspiration:
1. Use a large call-to action
The most obvious and relevant call to action is to invite visitors to click on the ‘Like’ button of your Facebook page. BMW has consistently used this tactic on its landing page, always updating the look and feel of the graphics in line with its current messaging. ..see BMW Facebook page
2. Create an interactive, user-oriented page
Depending on who your target audience is, encourage interactivity with suitable competitions, games and interactive video. Disney Pixar has done just this, framing activity on its landing page around its latest Disneyland project, John of the Jungle. Also observe Disney’s use of joined-up activity on YouTube, where visitors can upload photos to a competition…see Disney Pixar Facebook page More »
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are still perceived as the holy trinity of social marketing activity, based largely on their reach and popularity. Many businesses assume that the big three act as the cornerstone of an effective social media strategy, but is this a) a true reflection of how people are using social media today and b) the best option for every type of company?
Facebook marketing may be a no-brainer for global brands like Coca-Cola and Nike, but for a law firm specialising in divorce, nobody is likely to publicise their personal situation by ‘liking’ your company page. It may be more useful to create expert video advice on how to prevent divorce, or steps to finding the correct lawyer if separation is unavoidable. This video could then be posted to your own website, and adapted into a company blog post to be shared on Twitter.
These steps will help anyone from a reiki healer to a bookkeeper establish which platforms to make part of their social media activity:
1. Discover and investigate your target market by searching Google, Facebook, Twitter Search, YouTube, LinkedIn (especially the Groups and Q&A sections) and niche specific forums. More »
It is easy to feel smug as a marketer when your social media plan seems to be working. Who hasn’t felt a warm glow inside as the Facebook fans and Twitter followers finally roll in? Yet it isn’t always easy to convert fans and followers on social media into real-life clients. Each industry poses its unique challenges to conversion, but certain strategies need to be in place for any business to succeed.
A strong and effective blog
Fans and followers need to be offered the chance to get to know a company before they will buy its product or service. Only once the solid foundations of a relationship are in place will they become clients. This means sharing valuable content (see below) in the less salesy environment of a blog, and being sincere in your efforts to help people; the more value you can offer, the more your online connections will appreciate your company and what it has to offer.
Offer high quality content
Without your content, you have nothing. Your company is relating to people through content and what you write will make them decide whether they want to build a working relationship with you. It has to be as perfect as possible, so consider outsourcing your content strategy if resources are scarce. More »
Letting your brand’s content “run free” on social media by thinking beyond Facebook marketing will increase site traffic and revenues by 12.89%. So promised Michael Lazerow, founder and CEO of Buddy Media, speaking at the Mashable Media Summit 2011.
With 50% of the global population logging in daily and actioning 12 billion likes and comments per month, it is clearly essential to crack this immense platform. A whopping 94% of brands list Facebook as their top social media marketing priority – but what should they be doing to maximise traffic and revenue? Here is Lazerow’s recipe for breaking down the content barriers of social networks.
1. Set up and optimise your social presences
Use content to your advantage on Facebook, using it to crowdsource, offer free gifts and collect information. However, also focus on your content outside of Facebook. Your own websites and online stores are ultimately more important than your Facebook page.
2. Socialise all content to eliminate dead ends
A dead end occurs where a user does something then nothing happens. Small social hooks have the potential to drive a lot of traffic, so don’t waste them. For example, don’t run a poll on your website without also running a feed on Facebook. NFL did this and invited 43,336 votes. Also…think of Facebook’s Ticker as a free pay-per-click channel, sending free viral traffic to your website. More »
Last week Google+ unveiled its own take on brand and business pages: Google+ Pages. While Google may claim its network is not a Facebook competitor, its latest social marketing offer is a clear parallel to Facebook marketing tool, Facebook Pages. The question is, which brand page offers the most value to both users and advertisers?
Over at ReadWriteWeb.com, we found a comparison of Pages efforts from two leading luxury car companies: BMW and Mercedez-Benz. The verdict is that while Facebook has a first-mover advantage in terms of user numbers and its “comparatively advanced develop platform”, Zuckerberg and co. should not get too complacent just yet.
Engagement is the golden ticket to social marketing success. Let’s look at the BMW Pages as an example. Over on Facebook Pages, user numbers are high. BMW’s Facebook Page had 6.7 million fans as this article was written, compared to 394 BMW followers at Google+ (obviously, this is a fairly unfair comparison, given Google+’s recent entry to market).
Interactivity for BMW on Facebook is also high, with all fans invited to create their own customised BMW and to post to the BMW Page wall. BMW’s Google+ Page, still has a remarkably clean wall by comparison, since fans can’t post directly to it. There is less interaction, but on the plus side, the wall is clean and focused with little spam or irrelevant content. More »
A Facebook push might not initially reach as many people as a direct mail campaign, but the potential to garner valuable customer information makes social media a major contender, and the US finance industry is starting to take social very seriously.
A report in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal highlighted a new Facebook marketing effort by New York bank J.P. Morgan Chase – part of a wider offline advertising campaign. The bank ran a sweepstake for Facebook users who ‘Like’ its new credit card’s page on the social network, offering a grand prize of $1 million.
While the industry has been broadly slow to adapt to social media marketing, financial companies are now harnessing sites like Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare, primarily to gather data on consumer spending habits. Once somebody ‘Likes’ a company on Facebook, that company then has access to that user’s profile – offering a mine of useful information (as well as plenty of useless social titterings).
“If you are going to like something and through that mechanism be open to ongoing communications that says something about you,” Chase’s Card Services General Manager Matt Kane said. “What liking me does is allows me to push more information to you, which is what I will do.” More »
We’re sticking with Facebook for today’s blog, because let’s face it, the company has barely been out of the headlines recently. Hot on the heels of a series of new product launches came yesterday’s news of a beefed up offer to advertisers.
The brand new ‘People Talking About This” metric will post recent user discussions about brands directly onto the brand’s Page. In a bid to shift advertisers’ focus away from click-through rates and towards social influence, Facebook wants to show marketers exactly which types of posts appeal to the most people.
Meanwhile, a new premium ad product will allow brands to deliver ads to users while showing which of their friends have already Liked the ad. It is a novel approach based on the unique relevance and context offered by social marketing – apparently adding a friend’s name, photo or endorsement to an ad makes people twice as likely to remember an ad’s message, and four times as likely to go on to purchase (source: Nielsen).
But the best Facebook story of the day was over at nma.co.uk, where it was reported that Heinz is enabling people to send personalised cans of soup to friends and loved ones. Again, this report demonstrates the potential to entice consumers to engage with brands via social media marketing in ways that simply wouldn’t be possible on traditional channels. More »
Before Facebook grew big (think back), predicting which brands would become successes on the global site would have seemed a safe bet. You might have put your money on Starbucks, with its international following of laptop-happy caffeine junkies. Or you may have forecast big things for giant global youth brands Coca-Cola and McDonalds.
However, cast your eye down the list of Facebook’s top brands and what you’ll find, rather than a predictable rundown of the world’s top brands, is a rather random selection which proves that certain smaller companies are getting Facebook marketing right, while some major players just aren’t.
Courtesy of Mashable’s Digital Marketing Series supported by Hubspot, here is a rundown of Facebook’s surprise hits, and what they have been doing right:
1. Oreo
The ‘a-ha’ moment for Mark Clouse, senior vice president for global biscuits at Kraft Foods, came with the realisation in 2009 that about half of its then-5 million fans lived outside the US. Based on this finding, Oreo revamped its Facebook site to be more international user-friendly, for instance with the “world’s fan of the week” feature. The page now attracts more than 22 million sweet-toothed fans.
2. Nutella
Another sweet success story on Facebook – and a surprising one given that Nutella did pretty much nothing to establish its presence on the site initially. As it turns out, Nutella is one of those brands that gets social media users talking. The proof: there are no less than 12,000 YouTube videos featuring Nutella and 40,000 images featuring the product on Flickr. More »
Another week, another encouraging Facebook campaign success story for you, and this time from a lesser known start-up. We have heard this month that brands are continuing to take Facebook marketing very seriously, with the number of paid brand advertising campaigns rising by 104% in Q2 compared to Q1 (Source: TBG Digital).
Unsurprisingly, as Facebook campaigns have grown in popularity, costs have also increased (by 45% and 74% year-on-year in Q2 for CPM and CPC rates respectively).
With prices being hiked, it is especially refreshing to hear about emerging online businesses that are seeing strong results from Facebook brand campaigns. A trio of new case studies on clickz.com this week focused on start-ups – and one in particular caught our eye for its sage use of targeting to maximise ROI.
Case study: YouBeauty.com
Background: YouBeauty.com is a one-month old health and beauty website launched by Dr Oz and Dr Roizen, two doctors-turned-US-daytime-TV-personalities.
Aim: Primarily to grow its Facebook follower base with a budget of US$10,000. More »
The news that Amex is customising offers and deals based on what Facebook users and their friends ‘Like’ is – we think – an exciting glimpse of things to come for Facebook marketing.
AmEx’s new Facebook app, “Link, Like, Love”, invites users to link their cards to the unique programme and select deals. By choosing to ‘Like’ a certain retailer, for example, or even checking in at that shop’s location using Facebook Places, a user may then receive deals for that shop.
One of the most promising aspects of the programme is the way it neatly sidesteps the privacy issues of behavioural targeting. Users have to download the app, making it 100% opt-in and consensual – an intelligent evolution of social marketing.
Since it is built on AmEx’s Smart Offer APIs, which enable coupon-free offers, everybody is a winner. Customers don’t have to print off fiddly coupons, while merchants receive detailed reporting on how deals are being redeemed. More »
