Social Media Advertising- The What and the Why?
Advertising
is one branch of Marketing that has crossed many milestones in its journey-
straight from the early man era where carvings on stones was the primary media
to the Golden Age of Advertising where TV commercials, Radio ads and Print
advertising were the only ways known to Marketers. But the biggest boom in
advertising has been brought about one medium- The World Wide Web. The Internet has brought marketers closer to
consumers like never before and Social Media stands out on the Advertising Wall
of Fame as the gem that made this possible.
But
what exactly is Social Media Advertising
(SMA) and how is it different from Online Advertising?
Let’s find out below.
What
is Social Media Advertising?
In
very simple terms, it is any kind of
paid content on Social Media that companies-big and small, use to achieve
objectives like increasing Brand Awareness, Brand Engagement, Reach, increase
Traffic to their websites, and more.
Are
SMA and Online Advertising the same?
The answer is NO! SMA is a subset of Online
Advertising which comprises the use of only social media platforms like
Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to promote products and services. Online Advertising is a superset which
includes Search Engine Marketing, PPC
marketing, etc. In most cases, Online Advertising requires knowledge of certain keywords that
companies can bid on and drive traffic to their websites. In case a company
does not want to capture customer preferences but wants to increase brand
awareness, or acquire new customers,
or doesn’t have knowledge of the proper keywords to bid on, Online Advertising
will not be useful in that scenario. That’s where SMA comes in.
Why
should you use SMA?
The
Number 1 reason is because you have to be where
all your customers are! An online survey reports that Facebook now has
around 2.06 billion active monthly users worldwide and Instagram has over 700
million user accounts. People are using sites like these for entertainment,
shopping, reading, networking, and even for their daily news.
The
other reasons for SMA’s popularity are that it is the best medium to create brand awareness, build engagement, lead
generation, tracking revenue growth, capturing feedback, customer conversion,
etc. You are spoilt for choice while choosing the kind of objective you want to
fulfil- awareness, consideration or
conversion. SMA also opens doors to a number of Targeting techniques that
increases the personalization of communication and hence, conversion of
customers. In addition to all this, SMA today provides for the fastest and most real-time analysis of
customer data possible. All social networking sites have their own on-site
analytics arm and third party tools like Buffer, KISSmetrics, Google Analytics,
etc. also provide for better and faster analytics.
What
is Social Media?
While the most common examples that
spring to mind are Facebook and Twitter, they are but one type of all the
different social media there are. According to the types of utility that users
derive, Social Media can be classified into 10 categories:
1.
Social
networks
Example-
Facebook, Twitter
2.
Media
sharing networks
Utility? - Share photos, videos, and other media
Example-
Snapchat, Instagram
3.
Discussion forums
Utility? - Share news and ideas
Example-
Rediit, Quora
4. Bookmarking and
content curation networks
Utility? - Discover, save, and share
new content
Example-
Pinterest
5. Consumer review
networks
Utility? - Find and review businesses
Example-
Zomato, TripAdvisor
6.
Blogging and publishing networks
Utility? - Publish content online
Example-
Blogspot, WordPress, Tumblr
7.
Interest-based networks
Utility? - Share interests and hobbies
Example-
Goodreads
8.
Social shopping networks
Utility? - Shop online
Example-
Etsy, Limeroad, Craftsvilla
9.
Sharing economy networks
Utility? - Trade
goods and services
Example-
Airbnb
10.
Anonymous social networks
Utility? - Communicate anonymously
Example-
Ask.fm, Sarahah
For
companies the relevant social media channels are all from number 1 to 9. They
should steer clear of anything anonymous!
How
does SMA affect Targeting techniques?
SMA has opened up newer ways of
Targeting and has thus led to a much greater
degree of personalization of communication to the targeted customer base. The
broad advanced targeting options are:
1.
Interest targeting- This
is based on the self-expressed interest, likes, preferences of the users and
thus, companies can target specific groups based on this.
2.
Behavioral targeting-
People here can be targeted based on their past purchase behavior and
connection type (mobile data or WiFi).
3.
Custom targeting- A custom list of email
addresses, social media accounts, phone numbers, etc. can be targeted.
4.
Lookalike targeting- The people similar to the
identified audience based on interests or behaviors.
Tips
for a Better Social Media Strategy
Following
are some tips one must not forget while crafting a Social Media Advertising
strategy:
1.
Keep changing your digital ads frequently- Users
are always in need for fresh content. Considering that these ads are directly
on their social media feed, repeat ads are prone to frequent skipping and
irritating the customer.
2.
Make sure your ads are compatible on a mobile screen- Since most users today access
social media through their mobile phones, make sure your ads are such that they
are mobile phone friendly.
3.
Use the geofencing feature- Geofencing sends a notification to the customer when they
are in close proximity to the physical store. This results in better targeting.
4.
Use free social media to test your ad codes- It’s always a good idea to
make use of the free services to beta test your small ads and then go ahead
with the one with the most number of likes, clicks, comments and shares.
Keep
watching this space for more such related articles and for all things digital!
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