How Big Brands Make It Happen While You Can’t
Our social media marketing firm soon learned there are as many different ways to engage clients as there are businesses. It is an ongoing learning process for us. One of the major lessons embedded in our minds is the way large businesses do things. Small businesses assume they are unable to compete with the big guys because they can’t afford pricey television commercials or print campaigns across the country. In reality, research reveals big businesses become noticeable because they approach marketing differently. They find a way to stand out from the clamoring crowd and get remembered. This makes it possible to grow into one of the beloved mega-brands everyone recognizes.
With regard to social media marketing, it is easy to see how big brands and small businesses use different strategies. The benefit of social media is it equalizes everyone. Small businesses can compete on a level playing field with major corporations or their biggest competitors. Few consumers are shocked to see major corporations launch viral video campaigns with snappy slogans and memorable images. However, when a little guy makes a memorable video it is sure to get attention. It is a superior way to get your brand recognized without making a major investment. It’s all about standing a part from the competition.
Finding the Right Way to Do It
Unfortunately, small business owners continue to struggle to figure out the right way to market and brand themselves. Facebook, the biggest social media place on the globe, is a good place to start our analyzing. There is a difference between that big brands post and what pages put up for people to see. Some small businesses don’t realize the difference between having a profile, group or page on Facebook to make their appearance on this social media giant more legitimate. Learn how these different pages work to promote and brand your business or make it look even smaller than it is.
Updating Your Status – When smaller businesses update their status, it tends to be a short statement with nothing else to engage their visitors. On the other hand, big businesses incorporate videos and images into their status updates to make them more engaging. This simple difference can make a big impact on how successful your marketing endeavors are. Your status should be exciting and include something that catches the consumer’s eye and attention right away.
Visual Video – Getting visual with video is a way big brands draw their audience into a promotion or concept. YouTube is one of the hottest social media video websites, but any video can do the job. Using video is another recognizable difference between small businesses and big businesses. It is not an expensive way to market a business, yet it seems to be predominantly used by larger companies rather than smaller ones. Clients want video and big businesses are delivering it. Sometimes small business owners think it costs a lot or might not have the skills or equipment. A solution to these problems is outsourcing the work for a nominal fee. Research reveals that using video can be ten times more power-packed than using links, and boosts response and interaction. Moving pictures have been attracting attention for generations and social media marketing is another example where this holds true.
You Ought to Be in Pictures – Using photographs is an outstanding way to grab your audience. Adding images to your social media marketing campaign is a wise move on Facebook timeline profile pages and messages. Research continually proves using photos is more effective than text alone. Customers tend to spend more time reading and interacting with content that also contains photographs. They are also more likely to view that content. Photos are one of the most essential ways to grab attention on social media websites such as Pinterest and Facebook. With stock photo sites and digital cameras at your fingertips, the cost of posting photos is now minimal. Eye-catching photos that pertain to your content are an excellent accompaniment to your social media content. Small businesses tend to overlook using photos or use the same tired old images continually which is equally detrimental. The real deal about photos is they are five times better than using links. Photographs are colorful and make a statement to customers before they even read a word. It is said a picture is worth a thousand words and often this proves to be true – especially in social media marketing.
Thinking About Links – Many small business owners are excited about using a variety of links and make it the biggest part of their social media efforts. It really isn’t what works and can even be detrimental or simply a waste of time and effort. When compared to choices such as video and photos, links are the least effective. Your goals are to engage clients and build your brand to make it more recognizable. The ineffectiveness of links is based on a lack or originality and the fact many others might have linked to the same material and people are tired of it. If they have seen it before, you have managed to bore visitors rather than engage them. The big brands use few links. Rather, they are more likely to direct visitors to another campaign, coupons, discounts, a partnership deal or incentive. Minimize your use of links and make them more meaningful rather than connecting to stuff your customers probably know about already.
