Unit 13.3 Understand the use of promotional campaigns on social networking sites.

Creating a good campaign is really important and really difficult but nobody said that is impossible. Everything what we should know is what we want to create, when, where and how. Then we should define every step of our campaign and after that we should just start it. Of course we should consider every possible movement and all the time be concentrate on our goals. Nowadays we have a lot of potential services where we can do it but the biggest ones are the best ones. If you want to exist in the big world you should use services of big company.

3.1 Define promotional campaigns on social networking sites.

What is a social media campaign? How to increase social sales

In accoradnce to bigcommerce.com a social media campaign is a coordinated marketing effort to reinforce or assist with a business goal using one or more social media platforms. Campaigns differ from everyday social media efforts because of their increased focus, targeting and measurability.

Setting social media campaign goals

A social media campaign should focus around a singular business goal, whether it’s on Facebook or Instagram. Common goals for a social media campaigns include:

• Getting feedback from users.
• Building email marketing lists
• Increasing website traffic
• Improving overall brand engagement
• Directly driving sales

Goals must be discrete and measurable. Before a campaign, obtain a baseline measure of your targeted metric so you can track changes and performance throughout the campaign and beyond. Goals are shaped by the means, the message and the target audience. Different demographics also have varying preferences for social media platforms, so pick the platform suited to your target audience.

Building a social media campaign

Before starting a campaign, have in place all of the tools for tracking metrics. There are several free social media marketing apps which track shares, retweets, likes and keywords associated with your brand. Services such as HootSuite, Social Mention, and Addictomatic integrate with your social media accounts to determine who is seeing your social media posts and how they’re responding.

Once a baseline is established, define goals and schedule a definitive timeline for the campaign. Having firm start and end dates is important, both for a) keeping costs and mission creep in check, and b) comparing performance pre-and-post campaign.

Social media campaign best practices

• Action-gate – ask users to interact with social media posts. Invite them to ask questions, take polls, provide reviews, enter contests and join mailing lists.
• Provide incentives – give them a reason to provide information about themselves. Offer prizes, discounts and exclusive content in exchange for their attention and information
• Make prizes relevant to the business if using a contest. For a t-shirt company, it’s makes no sense to offer an Xbox as first prize in your contest (offer a year’s worth of t-shirts!).
• Proactively engage throughout the campaign – answer and address critique quickly and reinforce positive interactions with personal attention.
• Promote across all social media accounts, even if the campaign is focused on one platform (e.g. Facebook).
• Adapt the look and messaging of your entire online presence to reinforce the campaign. Include campaign branding and language on headers, landing and home pages.
• Carefully monitor performance and adjust strategy if needed.

3.2 Compare different types of promotional campaigns on social networking sites.

On the digitalmarketinginstitute we can find a lot information about different types of social media platforms to serve ads and for example we can use the followings:

• Social networking (Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+).
• Microblogging (Twitter, Tumblr).
• Photo sharing (Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest).
• Video sharing (YouTube, Facebook Live, Periscope, Vimeo).

1. Dacia

Platform Used

Facebook

About the Company

Dacia (a subsidiary of Renault) is one of Europe’s fastest growing car brands. Best known for their functional cars that offer amazing price-to-value ratios, the customer market grew by 60,000 cars in the last three years.

Goal

To generate leads and create brand awareness.

Solution

By using Facebook’s boosted posts, Dacia placed ads related to their Sandero, Logan, and Stepway models. They focused on both desktop and mobile users. By incorporating data from past activity, the company ensured that a wide variety of ad testing was done, essentially optimizing the advertisement’s impact based on where their customers were in the buying cycle.

Results

• 45% reduction in the costs per lead, compared to standard display ads
• 27-point increase in ad recall
• 6-point uplift in brand favorability
• 6-point uplift in purchase intent

Facebook’s always-on lead generation program generates a significant proportion of our test drive leads.- Antoine Hery, Digital Communications Manager, Renault

2. Red Bull

Platform Used

Instagram

About the Company

Consumers have been “given wings” for well over 28 years by Red Bull, and they ranked #76 on the Forbes Most Powerful Brand List in 2015. Their original energy drink can be found in over 170 countries, so it comes as no surprise that the company has sold over 60 billion cans of their famous drink. Since their humble beginnings back in 1987, the brand has since released 4 new flavors of energy drinks to cater to individual tastes and preferences.

Goal

To drive awareness of the extension of the brand.

The goal of their Instagram campaign was based on boosting awareness and sales of their tropical flavored “Summer Edition” energy drink for the Australian market.

Solution

With a firm focus on simplicity and brand building, Red Bull paved the way for their actual campaign with a promotional teaser just before the summer hit. To get audiences focused on the new look of the cans, they incorporated yellow filters across a range of images and videos portraying typical summer days. The brand was twice as likely to be associated with the #thissummer hashtag trend as any of its nearest competitors.

Results

• 10-point lift in top-of-mind awareness
• 9-point lift in favorability
• 7-point drop in the unconvinced market
• 1.2 million Consumers reached

Key Takeaway

There’s a massive market for campaigns launched on social media sites, and the power Instagram can have in driving engaged users is notable. In order to leverage the full power of a social media campaign on Instagram, you need to understand how consumers use social paths so that you can use them too. Red Bull did this with their #thissummer hashtag.

3.3 Explain why to use promotional campaigns on social networking sites.

Warren Jolly from the bigcommerce writes about social media advertising and how you can have consistent sales coming in from the first day your website is live.

For modern e-commerce sites, the ability to immediately and consistently bring in new customers is a HUGE deal. Even if you can’t achieve net positive revenue on the initial sale, referrals, email marketing and customer retention can pay off extensively with every marginal customer.

This is why global social ad spending doubled from $16 billion in 2014 to $31 billion in 2016 and is projected to increase another 26% in 2017.

In 2019, there are 6 different social media channels where you can follow proven ad strategies and generate consistent ROI (Return on investment).

These are the best places to invest your ad money right now.

1. Facebook.
2. Instagram.
3. Twitter.
4. Pinterest.
5. LinkedIn.
6. Snapchat.

Benefits Of Advertising Through Social Media Include:

• Grow your sales and your fanbase.
• Use customer generated content for ads (which perform better, too!).
• Better target net new and returning customers (so you waste less money).
• A/B test on the fly, using platform analytics to determine winners.

One of the fascinating things about social advertising is that there is virtually no limit to your ability to scale.

You don’t have to wait for someone to search for your targeted keywords. You don’t have to wait for someone to run your promotion or read your blog. If you want to reach 50,000 people in one day, you can.

Which social media network you choose will depend on 3 VERY important factors:

1. Where your target customers are most concentrated (usage, groups, etc.)
2. Where your target customers are most accessible (preferred media, ad targeting, etc.)
3. Where your target customers most actively engage with ads (testing required)

3.4 Explain the limitations imposed by social networking sites on promotional campaigns.

If your brand does not have a Facebook page, consider yourself a minority.  With a wealth of data available from social media analytics, what are the limitations of this data? So we a few examples of limitations imposed by social networking sites on promotional campaigns. Apple Lam from marketing-interactive writes about it and list it.

1. A high number of fans does not equal success

Christopher Wong, CEO of Klarity, said that from his experience, many Hong Kong companies use the number of social media followers and participants in a campaign to measure its effectiveness.

“But in my opinion, that is a very superficial way of looking at things. Having fans does not necessarily equate to true brand enhancement or real leads,” Wong said.

Comments and shares are much more powerful because they show affiliation to your brand but they are limited to very active fans – it is possible to have engaged less active fans who do not leave a comment or share your post.

2. Videos are sexy but their impact is hard to measure

You can time how long a person spends on a web page and what pages they browse through, even though you don’t know for how long they were actually reading text and surveying the images.

Similarly, with videos, it is challenging to determine how long a particular video has actually been watched and whether the viewer has in fact been paying attention the whole time.

3. The popularity of a platform may matter more than which platform is a suitable medium for your campaign

“Unfortunately, it is now about which platform has regional dominance rather than which platform is the best for a particular type of campaign,” Wong said.

For example, while Instagram and Pinterest can be the most effective for campaigns heavy in visuals, Twitter and Pinterest is not as popular in Hong Kong as it is in the US and Instagram is mostly used by the younger generation.

Facebook is a good option for interactive and game-based campaigns but it is not available in mainland China, where Sina Weibo would be the way to go.

Wong said, “But I know some marketers in mainland China who are looking at local social media sites other than Sina, which have a smaller reach but more real followers.”

4. Protection of user’s privacy limits data collection

Even though social media may seem like a very open space, social networks themselves limit the amount and specificity of data that you can collect to protect the privacy of its users.  Fans themselves also expect a certain level of privacy.

One example is how Facebook would provide an overall breakdown of where fans of a brand Facebook page resides without identifying exactly which fans and where they live.

5. Data is fragmented by platform

You might know how many dislikes a YouTube video has received and the same video posted on Facebook would have no dislike data available. Meanwhile, you can get a gender breakdown of your fans on Sina Weibo.  But there is no one-stop shop for all of this information in one platform.

6. It takes good analysis on the part of marketers to trace a link between ROI and social media

The path-to-purchase from social media, usually used to raise awareness and educate customers, is often an indirect process and customers may have to be channeled through well-known sales and marketing funnels.

Data needs to be analysed to zero-in on the right audience in order to make marketing campaigns more targeted.  These leads can then be converted into purchases in the long run.

Conclusion

To create good campaign is really difficult and we should remember a lot of things during whole campaign but when we will do it everything should be OK. We should define our goals, our methods then compare methods and choose the best one for us. Another important thing is to choose appropriate service of social media. The biggest social media companies can give us the biggest range and a lot of potential customers so here we have to use good platform and the results also should be good.

References:

https://www.bigcommerce.com/ecommerce-answers/what-is-a-social-media-campaign/- accessed on 01.02.19

https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/blog/5-successful-social-media-campaigns-you-can-learn-from – accessed on 01.02.19

https://www.marketing-interactive.com/6-limitations-social-media-data/ – accessed on 01.02.19Mariusz SobczykUncategorizedLeave a comment1st Feb 2019 8 Minutes

Unit 13.1 Principal of Social Media Advertising and Promotion

Currently digital vouchers are quite popular. In the past times people used paper vouchers which still exist but using digital vouchers is faster and easier. More and more people use smartphones to do almost everything there so it is good to create digital vouchers and put them online. Like I said it easy and fast to find and use it. Of course like everything in our world has advantages and disadvantages but about it you can read lower. The most important thing associated with digital vouchers is to create really good campaign.

1.1 Define the term digital vouchers.

In accordance to businessdictionary digital vouchers are available online for electronic orders that are also available to download and print for redemption in person. Digital coupons are available on company websites, social media outlets, texts, and email alerts. There are an increasing number of mobile phone applications offering digital coupons for direct use.

1.2 Explain the potential uses of digital vouchers.

Megan Byrne from the megansocialmedia writes that digital vouchers could be used to promote a product but offering money off. They can also be used to promote deals of the day. This is a good way to promote different products.Also you could use tickets or discounted gift certificates by delivered through web or via email. Digital vouchers are a good way to increase brand awareness. RetailMeNot said that ‘on average, consumers will spend 2 hours a week dedicated to hunting for deals online.’ You could also encourage social sharing of vouchers. This could be like a student discount code. By sharing these vouchers this could encourage more people use your products or services. RetailMeNot said that ‘40% of consumers will share an email offer with their friend and 28% of consumers will share deals via social media platforms’.

1.3 Research the current disadvantages of digital vouchers.

Disadvantages of Using Coupons

Risk on Brand Iimage

On the galido we read that discount codes may have a negative impact of your brand image. Discount coupons may make your company look cheap. The risk is bigger to luxury brands such as Gtech. One way to counteract the risk of damaging your brand is to maintain the price of the core product as is, while offering coupons on the extra items. Gtech discount codes, for example, give you free shipping within the UK. When the company offer shipping for free, there is no discount on the main product.

Risk of Making a Loss

Discount codes might prove to be costly and end up reducing your profit margins. The only way to skirt this issue is by knowing what you can reasonably afford to discount. Sometimes, your product might not carry the margin required to provide a coupon. For instance, if Gtech’s cleaners sell for £199 and it costs the company £100 to pay the manufacturer, plus £50 in marketing and operating costs per unit, then issuing 25% off Gtech codes would mean that the company makes a loss.

Reduced Revenue

If you give a discount to all clients, even to those who would still buy at full price, you effectively reduce profits from all sales. A good way to market coupons is to offer them to new customers, or to select customers on special occasions.

For example, using social media, you can connect personally with potential clients and offer them generous discounts via Messenger on their birthday. Alternatively, you can wish them happy birthday on their Timeline together with a coupon or link to a special offer. This is even better than Messenger because other people get to see the offer and your brand.

According to investopedia.com the biggest con of using coupons is that they cost you money. Any discount you offer will mean less money in your pocket. The key is to calculate whether that discount will make a difference to your profit margin by introducing new customers to your store or bringing back old customers who may have gone elsewhere chasing other coupons. Jay Goltz, in the New York Times column, “Doing the Math on a Groupon Deal,” developed a method to calculate whether or not a coupon discount is worth it for your business.

Even your regular customers can get in the habit of waiting for coupons, which cannibalizes income that was already being generated before you introduced the coupon program. So you need to consider when and how to offer those coupons to avoid impacting your regular customer base.

Coupons will always result in reduced profits on the item or items included in the coupon campaign, but the cost of purchasing that product will not change. When considering the value of a coupon campaign to your business, you must find a way to determine if the discount will end up improving your bottom line in the long term. We talk more about how to use a coupon campaign strategically to grow your business below.

1.4 Explain how to overcome the barriers of using digital vouchers for acquisition and retention of customers.

Megan Byrne claims writes also about process for customer retention. According to the Harvard Business School, increasing customer retention rates by 5 percent increases profits by 25 percent to 95 percent. I think a good way for customer retention is communication, this could be email updates with new stock or promotions. The next point in the process is selling. If customers had a good buying process with you, for example when I brought a new car the company gave me constant updates via email and phone and all the staff were really friendly and helpful, customers will most likely will use your company or products again. Also by offering good customer service, this could attract new customers via the word of mouth.I think the next point of customer retention is support. This could be by answering customer queries or complaints quickly and effectively. Another way to overcome the barriers would be by offering your customers incentives. For example, you could run competitions on your social media pages to encourage engagement and gain more brand awareness as well as getting customers involved. Another incentive could be using photos or reviews from your customers, you could do this by post asking customers to post pictures of them using your product and that your company can then share. A further example would be giveaways. You could run a giveaway campaign by using your social media accounts as a way to enter. You can offer brand special exclusive deals. For example, Dominos post a variety of discounts and vouchers to local areas to encourage people to buy their products. Another example would be loyalty cards. Big companies such as Starbucks, Costa, Subway and Morrisons offer there customers points cards so after a certain amount of purchases they get a reward. According to RetailMeNot ’91% of coupon redeemers have said they will purchase from a retailer again’.

1.5 Plan a SMART digital voucher campaign for a business.

Specific – Digital voucher campaign is going to be for clothes shop. We should run a voucher code on our online shop and social media accounts. If people use this voucher they will have 15% off.Measurable – To raise sale by 10%.Achievable – I think this is a very achievable goal because people have an opportunity to buy what they want but they can pay less for it. In summary is it possible they will buy more products from our store.Relevant – This is a good goal to gain more customers eventually resulting in a profit.Timely – This campaign will run throughout the month of May and will end on the 31st May.

1.6 Explain methods of managing a digital voucher system.

Companies are typically using a variety of tools to manage very basic coupon campaigns. But these tools that provide an “out of the box solution” have certain limitations when it comes to the actual integration with your system.

On the other hand, companies tend to try and build some kind of solution in-house. I call this the Promotion Dilemma – marketers waste their promotional budget by creating ineffective campaigns, and developers defocus because of ongoing campaign requests from marketers and tool maintenance. Tools developed in house are expensive and have limitations in functionality, scalability and flexibility.

In my experience, your business might be focused on coupon codes today, but tomorrow your promotional marketing requirements will change. In future you will have more complex use cases with a variety of validation requirements or even referral and loyalty program requirements.

If you are a marketer that is serious about scaling your business, avoid limiting yourself to a single tool or software which in itself limits you to a small number of very specific use cases.

1.7 Explain how to measure the effectiveness of a digital vouchers campaign.

Jessica Athorn describes two ways of measure the effectiveness of a digital vouchers campaign.

1 – On most social media networking sites, you see the analytics of how much engagement you are getting over a certain period of time so this could be used to track how much you are improving engagement since the start of the campaign.

2 – Another way to measure the effectiveness of the campaign could be to simply see if your sales have increased since starting the campaign as this would be a clear indicator of if the campaign is working or not.

Conclusion

So now we know what digital vouchers are. Is it good to use it now because majority of people use smartphones and this number will raise in the future. The most important things about digital vouchers are: fast and easy. Of course we should plan a really good campaign. If we want to have a expensive shop or service we should consider of using digital vouchers because when people think about digital vouchers they think about something cheap. Then we can manage whole campaign manually or by special tools or we cane hire a specialist for it. Everything depends on us.

References:

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/digital-coupon.html – accessed on 01.02.19

http://megansocialmedia.blogspot.com/2016/06/unit-308-principles-of-social-media.html – accessed on 01.02.19

https://galido.net/blog/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-using-coupon-codes/ – accessed on 01.02.19

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/051815/pros-cons-using-coupons-your-business.asp – accessed on 01.02.19

https://jessicaathornapprentice.wordpress.com/2017/04/26/unit-308-task-b/ – accessed on 01.02.19