To Instagram or to Vine? That is the question. Which social video tool is better for business?
The newest video feature on Instagram is one of the hottest topics in the world of social media, and rightfully so. This newly integrated social video tool means that Facebook (which owns Instagram) has taken yet another step further in controlling the social world.
A few months ago, Twitter introduced their social video tool, Vine. This was a big deal then and now everyone wants to know: which of these two platforms has more advantages for business?
Though they both possess some strong characteristics, when it comes to business, Instagram video has the edge. Below is a comparative justification for the advantages of Instagram for business.
Quality
One word: Cinema. This is the feature on Instagram’s video service that allows users to stabilize videos. This may not seem like much, but for businesses, it means the ability to create videos that appear somewhat more professional. Users can also edit videos on Instagram instead of scrapping them entirely and having to start over (which is a downside to Vine).
Second, as with it’s pictures, Instagram Video allows users to apply over a dozen filters to videos whereas Vine is a what-you-see-is-what-you-get platform (for now).
Length
You can do a lot of creative stuff on Vine in only six seconds, but imagine what you could do with twice that much (and a little bit more).
Videos made with Instagram can be up to 15 seconds long, lending businesses the opportunity to convey their message with a little more clarity. It also allows for a call-to-action to appear for an extra second or two. And in the online world, a second or two is a lifetime.
Embedding
Vine certainly has the edge here, and it is a big one.
Videos on Vine can be easily embedded while Instagram still has yet to include this feature. That’s a big plus for Vine, because it allows businesses to share their videos on different platforms, including their WordPress blog with the plugin, Embedly.
This is not unexpected. Facebook has been notoriously streamlining all of their efforts in order to, as we mentioned earlier, take over the Internet. Although it should not be long before we see some version of embedding capable with Instagram videos.
The same cannot be said for sharing, however.
Sharing
Videos on Instagram can be shared to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Foursquare, Flickr and via email. With Vine, your videos can only go as far as Facebook and Twitter.
Audience
Finally, the biggest difference of them all: the audience.
Vine currently has about 13 million users. Instagram’s user-base is ten times that! With such a vast audience on Instagram, you have to wonder if Vine is still a relevant and viable option for businesses on social media.
Vine is an intriguing tool, and can be a lot of fun. (Just look at comedian Will Sasso’s Lemon Compilation on Vine.) But when it comes to the benefits of a social video tool for business, Instagram certainly has the edge.
Have you used Instagram Video or Vine for business? Which one do you think is more beneficial? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
Social Media Case Study: SmartPak Equine
/by Corey PadveenEquestrian products is not the first category to come to mind when one thinks of social media case study, but SmartPak Equine proved that a proper strategy can work anywhere.
Before getting into the campaigns that make up this social media case study, it is important to understand what triggered emails are. Unlike conventional automated “Welcome” or “Thank You” emails, event-triggered emails are sent out when an action or event prompts the email. For example, if I have an account, am loading products into my cart for an order and get distracted by a phone call causing me to abandon the order, an email will be sent to me that allows me to return top my cart and complete the order.
This is not always a preferred method by consumers – some find it a little too aggressive. However, SmartPak Equine noticed that their audience was responding well to these emails. Specifically, they were seeing a high level of engagement and conversion with three types of event-triggered emails: shipping reminders, product review reminders and abandoned cart reminders. (For full details on each of these three campaigns, read a breakdown here.)
These three types of triggered emails prompt further engagement with the brand’s website, encourage additional purchases and maintain brand awareness with customers to increase loyalty.
The results of this potentially risky approach has been a 28% open rate, a 5-6% clickthrough rate, a surprisingly high 11% conversion rate and a revenue per email nearly three times higher than conventional, manual email marketing.
So what can marketers learn from these event-triggered campaigns and the successes SmartPak Equine has garnered?
Understand Your Audience
This is not an email strategy that will work with every type of industry. SmartPak took the time to understand their audience, realize how niche they were and create a strategy that would appeal specifically to them.
It is crucial that you understand what your audience wants and how they interact with your brand before putting together a campaign – particularly one as aggressive as this.
Keep Your Audience Coming Back
Of the three most popular campaigns described above, two focus heavily on maintaining brand awareness with existing customers. Retaining clients and maintaining a relationship with them in order to keep them coming back is important to the long-term success of your brand. In order to ensure that this happens, you cannot rely entirely on the customer; you need to take some initiative.
Talk to your audience and customers (however and wherever possible) in order to keep your brand in mind next time they are looking to buy.
Don’t Pretend You Are Not a Business
The goal of every event-triggered email sent by SmartPak is sales. The results? 175% more revenue and 83% higher conversion rates. Social media is about being social and talking to your audience, that’s true. But a conversation will not keep you in business unless it leads to sales.
Make yourself human, talk to your audience and engage wherever you can, but use these conversations as a means of driving business.
SmartPak implemented all of these strategies and their efforts paid off handsomely.
Which of these tips do you think is most important to generating success with social media or email marketing? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter and have a happy 4th of July!
4 Tips for Tumblr Beginners
/by Corey PadveenThere are certain best practices Tumblr beginners need to be aware of in order to take full advantage of the social blogging network.
Tumblr is a social blogging platform that allows users to share content that appeals to them on a customized, fully social blog. Sounds great, right? Well, in order for Tumblr to work for you, it is crucial that you follow certain best practices. Otherwise, your blog is just one of the tens of millions with little activity.
Tag Your Posts
Tumblr tags are an excellent way of increasing your post’s visibility. At the bottom of your post (shown below) you will find an area in which to add tags. Take advantage of this the same way you would tags on a standalone blog post. People can search for tags and categories on Tumblr, and the more well described your post in tag-form, the better the chances that people will find your content.
Diversify Your Content
One of the great features of Tumblr is the ability to share several types of content. Your posts can be as simple as a single image or a quote from your favorite author or as complex as a step-by-step explanation of functionality of a particle accelerator.
One key thing to remember, however, is that you should aim to share a diverse selection of content (all related to your blog’s theme and tone) in order to engage as broad an audience as possible. You might have a small group interested in the process of particle acceleration, but be able to broaden your reader base with an album of some impressive, research-grade particle accelerator images.
Social Sharing
You’ll notice in the image above (in the tags section) that there are small icons under your post for Facebook and Twitter. Now, this might not apply to all of your posts (you don’t necessarily want to duplicate other posts on Facebook or Twitter) but in order to streamline your social media marketing, you should consider sharing the content you post on Tumblr to your other social networks.
This is a great way of promoting your Tumblr blog and quickly building your readership.
Be Social!
Tumblr might be a blog, but it is as much a social network as Facebook or Twitter. You should be re-blogging (sharing other people’s content to your own blog) and commenting on other blogs the same way you would on Facebook.
Being social is the goal of Tumblr, and it is also a great way of increasing your own exposure on the network.
Though there is a lot more to Tumblr than these 4 simple tips, these are must-dos for Tumblr beginners in order to get the Tumblr activity off the ground.
Do you use Tumblr for social blogging? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
6 Types of Content to Post on Facebook
/by Corey PadveenThere is no shortage of content to post on Facebook, but what type of content is going to help build your business?
So how did Wal-Mart get there? A lot of elements factored into their success, but when it comes to the types of content to post on Facebook, every brand can learn a thing or two from Wal-Mart.
Below are the six types of content observed by Wishpond that Wal-Mart shared on Facebook to bring their brand to the top.
Product-Specific
Roughly 45% of the content shared on the Wal-Mart Facebook page is product-specific. There is often talk of avoiding promotional content, but if you are not trying to showcase what you have to offer, then you are not really making an effort to drive business, are you?
Wal-Mart found a nice balance in sharing content about their products a little less than half of the time.
Fun and Entertaining
About a tenth of the content shared by Wal-Mart are fun internet memes with little or no correlation to their products or services. Simply sharing content people will enjoy seeing.
Engagement-Oriented
Roughly 13% of the content on Wal-Mart’s Facebook page encourages fan participation. Asking questions, opinions and other engaging types of content are important to keep your fans coming back and get your fan base growing.
This type of content is also a great way to get user feedback and find out what’s going well and where you should make some changes.
Informative and Useful
If you can provide helpful information that your users can actually put into practice, then you are providing a service that makes your page all the more valuable to your audience. For Wal-Mart, this type of content makes up roughly 15% of their posts.
Culturally Significant
Again, a tenth of the content shared by Wal-Mart relates to events and culture in their target market. By sharing content that is socially and culturally relevant to their target audience, they give their target audience all the more reason to become fans on Facebook.
Social Awareness
Lastly, another 10% of the content shared by Wal-Mart sheds light on events, organizations and causes that are culturally and socially significant to both the brand and the audience. People like to know that there is more to a brand than business. Show a lighter, more thoughtful side of your brand. Goodwill is just as important as anything else your company does.
Wal-Mart has found an excellent balance of content on their page. Take a look at it and you will understand why.
What type of content do you think is most important to be sharing on Facebook? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
LinkedIn Facts & Figures 2013 [INFOGRAPHIC]
/by Corey PadveenLinkedIn is the business network, but what are the benefits to using the network?
The LinkedIn facts and figureds in the infographic below showcase some impressive data that marketers and businesspeople should be aware of.
We all know that LinkedIn is the professional social network – that is what sets it apart from the rest. But other than being a pool of a few hundred million working folk, what value does LinkedIn have when it comes to helping us grow our business?
Perhaps the most interesting figure when it comes to professional relationships in the data below relates to the growth of face-to-face relationships with the help of LinkedIn. 44% of users build stronger in-person relationships with the help of LinkedIn. That is certainly a feature unique to the network.
When it comes to business, the most important element of the LinkedIn facts has to do with trust. 87% of people on LinkedIn trust the product-related information they find on the network. What’s more, 49% of users trust word-of-mouth brand suggestions they see on LinkedIn. That’s a lot of influence on the network, and it certainly should not be passed up.
Take a look at the infographic and let us know which of the data you think is most important or surprising. Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
Social Equity: Reputation Management on Social Media
/by Corey PadveenReputation management on social media is becoming more and more important, and engaging in the activity properly can add significant Social Equity to your brand.
There are two main areas where Social Equity is generated from reputation management on social media: effective reputation management creates brand loyalty and crises are handled effectively and in some cases staved off.
Though reputation management on social media also benefits brands in a number of other ways, these two aspects add the most value to a brand in both the short and long terms; brand loyalty and crisis management.
Brand Loyalty
Brands survive because of consumer loyalty. Brand evangelists and loyalists are very difficult to cultivate, but when your brand finds them, you have struck oil.
The benefit of brand loyalists is that they will advocate for your company in good times and in bad, but these gems only come about when you are treating your customers properly. And that means before, during and after the purchase has been made.
Properly managing your reputation online through engagement makes it easier to both acquire new brand loyalists and keep them happy over the course of their involvement with your company. Think about it: people might be talking about your company (in either good or bad lights) and if you are not monitoring your online reputation, you will never know about it.
Finding and engaging with your brand loyalists also relates closely to crisis management on social media.
Manage a Crisis
In the world of social media, a second can change the perception of your brand indefinitely. Now imagine if you let that second turn into minutes, then hours, then weeks. Eventually, your brand is known for nothing other than that second, and your reputation is damaged irreparably.
Properly managing your reputation means addressing these issues in real time with an active audience on social media. Before issues spiral out of control, you can get a handle on a situation and potentially resolve a crisis before it is out of your hands.
Crisis management on social media by proper reputation management can do wonders for building Social Equity for your business. The ability to prevent disasters before they happen means maintaining your brand’s sterling reputation, and allows the value of your brand to remain undamaged.
Reputation management is an important area for brands to focus on when it comes to social media. Not only does it help brands better understand their consumers, flaws and catch on to issues, but it also adds a considerable degree of value both in the short- and long-run.
Do you manage your reputation on social networks? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
Social Media Case Study: H&M
/by Corey PadveenHow did H&M use Google+ to captivate and engage an audience?
There are a few key features that make H&M an interesting case study for Google+. First, there is the close, personal attention H&M pays to its fans on the network along with the exclusive content they share. Second, H&M monitors their data closely and modifies their Google+ strategy. And third, H&M integrates several key add-ons that help the brand generate business from the network.
Engagement
The devotion H&M has shown to its fans on Google+ should be noted by any marketer looking to build brand loyalty. H&M fans on Google+ are encouraged to share content, which the brand then features on their page.
Conversations are also started by the brand, and visual content is shared on a regular basis in an effort to drive fans to landing pages. Furthermore, much of this content is exclusive to Google+.
It is important to reward your fans. We discussed this recently in an article about Cadbury’s big ‘Thank You’ to their fans. The difference with H&M, however, is that the fashion brand focuses on thanking their Google+ fans with exclusive content. This is an excellent way to engage an audience, and H&M has the numbers to prove it.
Data
The ‘Ripples’ feature on Google+ can be one of your most powerful weapons in developing a strong Google+ campaign – if you know how to use it.
H&M monitors the data in the backend of Google+ in order to understand how, where and when their content is being shared and make the necessary modifications to their strategy in order to ensure that their engagement and share rates remain high. Any marketer will tell you that data and reporting will make or break a campaign. It is important that whenever possible you examine the data you have, and ‘Ripples’ are a powerful feature on Google+.
Integration
Did we mention that Google+ is owned by Google? H&M realizes that and they integrated their AdWords campaigns with their Google+ efforts. The results? Only a 22% CTR (click-through rate) uplift. Not too shabby.
It is important to streamline your processes wherever possible. If the whole machine is functioning together, you stand to produce far better results than if every part is trying to work on its own.
Do you actively use Google+ to engage an audience? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
Instagram Video or Vine? Which Social Video Tool is Better for Business?
/by Corey PadveenTo Instagram or to Vine? That is the question. Which social video tool is better for business?
A few months ago, Twitter introduced their social video tool, Vine. This was a big deal then and now everyone wants to know: which of these two platforms has more advantages for business?
Though they both possess some strong characteristics, when it comes to business, Instagram video has the edge. Below is a comparative justification for the advantages of Instagram for business.
Quality
One word: Cinema. This is the feature on Instagram’s video service that allows users to stabilize videos. This may not seem like much, but for businesses, it means the ability to create videos that appear somewhat more professional. Users can also edit videos on Instagram instead of scrapping them entirely and having to start over (which is a downside to Vine).
Second, as with it’s pictures, Instagram Video allows users to apply over a dozen filters to videos whereas Vine is a what-you-see-is-what-you-get platform (for now).
Length
You can do a lot of creative stuff on Vine in only six seconds, but imagine what you could do with twice that much (and a little bit more).
Videos made with Instagram can be up to 15 seconds long, lending businesses the opportunity to convey their message with a little more clarity. It also allows for a call-to-action to appear for an extra second or two. And in the online world, a second or two is a lifetime.
Embedding
Vine certainly has the edge here, and it is a big one.
Videos on Vine can be easily embedded while Instagram still has yet to include this feature. That’s a big plus for Vine, because it allows businesses to share their videos on different platforms, including their WordPress blog with the plugin, Embedly.
This is not unexpected. Facebook has been notoriously streamlining all of their efforts in order to, as we mentioned earlier, take over the Internet. Although it should not be long before we see some version of embedding capable with Instagram videos.
The same cannot be said for sharing, however.
Sharing
Videos on Instagram can be shared to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Foursquare, Flickr and via email. With Vine, your videos can only go as far as Facebook and Twitter.
Audience
Finally, the biggest difference of them all: the audience.
Vine currently has about 13 million users. Instagram’s user-base is ten times that! With such a vast audience on Instagram, you have to wonder if Vine is still a relevant and viable option for businesses on social media.
Vine is an intriguing tool, and can be a lot of fun. (Just look at comedian Will Sasso’s Lemon Compilation on Vine.) But when it comes to the benefits of a social video tool for business, Instagram certainly has the edge.
Have you used Instagram Video or Vine for business? Which one do you think is more beneficial? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
4 Features Every Blog Post Should Have
/by Corey PadveenThere are certain features every blog post should have in order to both be seen as a quality article by your audience and work to help build your readership.
Though there are certain elements unique to one post or another, the four elements below should always find their way into each of your posts.
Shareability
You want your content to reach as many people as possible, right? Well then you should include means through which your audience can share it!
Adding share buttons to your blog should be one of the first things you do once you get started. The easier it is to share your great content, the faster your audience and reader loyalty will grow!
Images
Sure, images look great and add a visual aspect to your posts, but including an image with the proper alt tags is an excellent way to get found. It is important to optimize your blog for search engines in every way possible, and properly tagged images are one way to do that.
The presence of an image or two also means that Pinterest now becomes a player in the social sharing game. Recently, the photo pinning network surpassed Twitter as one of the top sources for social referral traffic and it shows no signs of stopping. So add images to your blog posts – they are far more valuable than you might think.
Questions
Get the conversation started and engage your audience every time you post. End your article with a question, or ask your audience for their thoughts. You might have a group of readers that want to take part in the conversation but still need that extra push to get involved, so give it to them!
Succinctness
You are not writing a novel. The poetics and imagery are not nearly as important as the substance. (Unless of course you are writing a blog about poetics and imagery.)
Online attention spans are not very long – only a few seconds, actually. You need to grab your audience’s attention fast and share what you need to quickly. Filling an article with fluff will mean a higher bounce rate. But if you are clear and concise you can surely expect reader to come back for more.
These are just a few features every blog post should have. There are certainly more, but these are among the most important – no matter what type of blog you are writing.
What other features have you found to be important when it comes to successful blogging? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
The Perfect Post on Social Media [INFOGRAPHIC]
/by Corey PadveenWhat makes the perfect post on social media?
To qualify something as ‘perfect’ is rather extreme. Everyone has different tastes, and people are going to appreciate and react to your content in different ways. To say that one specific post is the ‘perfect post on social media’ might be a little farfetched. However, the folks at mycleveragency have put together an infographic detailing what makes the data-supported ‘perfect’ post on a number of social networks.
The data is taken from a number of studies and surveys and is derived from one common element: what makes the majority tick? How are you supposed to draft content that generates engagement, clicks and conversions on each social network? Sharing the same content across every network is not going to work – people on Google+ will not necessarily react to content the same way as people on Pinterest.
The infographic also shares some interesting information regarding the best and worst times to post on different social networks. A little while back, we posted an article that detailed some similar information, and it would appear as though some new evidence shows that user behaviour has changed in some areas and remained the same in others. Interesting stuff!
Take a look at this infographic and try modifying your content according to the tips highlighted here. Let us know if you agree with these tips or if you have found another version of your perfect post on social media! Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!
Social Equity: Targeted Campaigns on Social Media
/by Corey PadveenTargeted campaigns on social media provide certain unique benefits that can add significant value to your business.
Targeted campaigns on social media, however, provide similar capabilities at a fraction of the cost, and generate a significant degree of Social Equity.
Targeted campaigns generate Social Equity for your business in two distinct ways. First, while your reach may not be extremely broad, it is far more specific than with conventional campaigns and therefore generates higher conversion rates. Second, targeted campaigns on social media are far more cost effective than other types of marketing and advertising that generate similar results – and those are few and far between.
Value Added
As noted above, the ability to target a very specific audience leads to higher conversion rates. When you are able to tailor an ad specifically for the audience that it is reaching, you can expect that the engagement levels will be significantly higher than a case where a generic ad is shared to a mass audience.
Of course, marketers and advertisers try to do this on other media as well. Using the available data, campaigns are launched to specific audiences wherever possible. However, on social media the ability to narrow down your targeted audience is far easier and the results of a well-executed campaign will be much higher.
One example of this is a social media case study we looked at recently about Vestas, a wind energy provider. Vestas put together a very targeted campaign and sent it to 50 companies. For each executive or employee that came into contact with the campaign, Vestas had created a version of the campaign targeted specifically towards that company. The results were high engagement, significant conversion and the campaign was an overall success.
Costs Saved
The second area in which Social Equity is derived from targeted campaigns is in the costs that are saved from engaging in this type of campaign on social networks.
As noted at the beginning of this article, reaching 80% of your desired audience was easy at the dawn of television, but today the cost is far too prohibitive. On social media, however, you can still reach your targeted audience at a fraction of the cost.
The ability to launch targeted campaigns geared towards engaging your desired audience for a relatively low cost (compared to reaching the same audience with other media) is a big value. Increasing your exposure and growing your business at rates comparable to those that involve significant ad spending will benefit your business significantly in the long-run.
Often, Social Equity is as much about how much you are saving as it is about how much you are making.
Have you executed any targeted campaigns on social media? Tell us about them in the comments below or on Twitter!