PSA for Marketers: Utilize Multiple Social Channels!

These days, social media is not only a way users interact with each other, but also a way in which they interact with brands. If done correctly, social media can increase positive consumer perception of a specific brand. Consumers are typically not active on one social platform alone, so brands that are not active on more than one platform could definitely be missing out on capturing more audience attention or potential new business.

In addition to missing out on a portion of your audience, being active on multiple social platforms means increased search engine rankings, a great customer service experience, and being on par with the rest of your competition, as they are already on multiple platforms (Hovde, 2017). A breakdown of each point is below:

·      Increased search engine rankings- As we know, “content is king,” and the more content, the better. More quality social media content will help a company boost their rankings.

·      Greater customer service experience- Being active on multiple social platforms means a company or brand can see more about what customers are saying about them. Customers can also send direct messages, and if there are any types of anticipated issues, the company can be proactive and warn customers before anything occurs.

·      Competition is already on multiple social platforms- When a customer expects your brand to be on a specific platform and you are not, they could turn to competitors that are active on that channel. Do not let your competitors have an extra shot at reaching your customers!

Although being active on multiple social platforms is essential for companies, not just any platform will do. Companies really need to take a look at their industry and business goals to determine which, if any, social platforms do not make sense to tap into. According to Neil Patel, company marketers should be asking the following questions in order to decide which social channels are right for their business and/or which channels to add to their social strategies:

1.     Where is my audience?

2.     Where is my audience active?

3.     Where is my audience searching?

4.     What niche social media sites are right for me? (Patel, 2018).

Patel suggests that by following the below rules, your company will see a return on your investment:

“Must: Join the Big Four: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+

Should: Consider the Lesser Three: Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube

Could: Check out Two of the Little Ones: Tumblr, StumbleUpon, Reddit

Possibly: Find One Niche Site” (2018).

This strategy suggests being active where it is essential, but also finding a way to make use of social media unique to your brand or business. Generating great content is a must, however, if this content does not lead to engagement amongst audience members, the content’s ROI will be weak.

“Content without conversation is just broadcasting…It goes to the listener/reader/viewer/visitor…and stops there” (Novak, 2010). Any content that is posted for marketing purposes must have the intent to be an engagement vehicle. These sentiments also enforce the idea that a brand/company focusing on just one social media platform alone are missing out on engaging consumers through multiple other channels.

To summarize: marketers need be thoughtful when it comes to content.

“Our world is shaped by the relationships and conversations we have with other people – by the emotions we feel as well as the information we receive. As you consider the message you have to bring to the world, ask yourself: is this a conversation starter? Who will I interact with as a result of my putting it out there? How will the conversation proceed? What might happen?” (Novak, 2010).

The result of the engagement will lead to marketers better understanding their consumer base.

Real Life Examples of Social Media Success:

Wayfair

In 2017, Wayfair capitalized on new shopping features offered through Instagram. This new feature allows products to be tagged so Instagram users can go right to a specific landing page to view the product in more detail.

Here’s an example of the tagged products:

(Jackson, 2018).

After clicking on a product and getting to a landing page, users will also be able to see all items tagged in the original post as well, a good selling point for complementary items for purchase. 

(Jackson, 2018).

When the user hits the “shop now” button, they are directed right to the Wayfair site to complete their order.  

Of course, this type of feature is great for a retail business like Wayfair. But Instagram is not the only social channel Wayfair executes well. They are sure to create compelling, engaging content on other channels as well.

For Facebook, for instance, Wayfair has expanded their use of video content to better understand their customer. They even use an in-house team to produce and edit this video content. Wayfair’s Facebook followers enjoyed the content and were highly engaged, which “weighed more heavily in Facebook’s algorithm” (Wayfair Social Media – The Shorty Awards, 2017). These videos assisted in achieving a 409% YOY increase in reach. With more reach comes the opportunity for even more engagement!

That same year, Wayfair also increased Instagram audience by 114% YOY and negative sentiment on Twitter decrease by 20% (2017). This is a great example of a social media strategy involving multiple social channel activity.

Casper

Staying relevant and up front in a consumer’s mindset is challenging enough for any product. When it comes to mattresses as the selling product, that issue becomes even more difficult. However, mattress brand Casper has been able to do just that through an effective social media strategy.

Casper tries to insert humor into their social media content, which can sometimes be a tricky thing to accomplish. You can see a glimpse into why from the chart below…

(Jackson, 2018).

   …however Casper seems to be pulling it off. Instead of focusing content on product attributes alone, Casper tends to comment on the importance of sleep and other benefits that a good sleep provides, in addition to continuously posting humorous content and responding to and retweeting their fans. 

(Casper, 2018).

(Michael Allen’s Ghost, 2018).

Casper also understands that while they are active on multiple social channels, that doesn’t mean that all members of their audience are active on each of these channels, so Casper posts frequently and also posts the same content on multiple channels.

See a pattern here? Wayfair and Casper have different strategies and use social media in various ways, but engagement is at the core of these strategies. 

References

Casper. [Casper]. (2018, October 25). The uninterrupted sleep you’ve been dreaming about is here. Introducing the new Casper Wave: casper.com/wave. [Twitter post]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/casper

Hovde, K. (2017, February 22). Multiple Social Media Accounts is a Must. Retrieved October 27, 2018, from https://www.business.com/articles/why-every-business-should-be-using-multiple-social-media-accounts/

Jackson, D. (2018, June 07). 8 Standout Social Media Marketing Examples From 2018. Retrieved October 27, 2018, from https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-marketing-examples/

Michael Allen’s Ghost. [Mike_bo_bike]. (2018, October 23). Not gonna lie, a slumber party at the @Casper store would be sweet. [Twitter post]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/casper

Novak, C. (2010, July 27). Why conversation, not content, is king. SocialMediaToday.com. Retrieved from http://socialmediatoday.com/wordspring/152636/why-conversation-not-content-king

Patel, N. (2018, July 17). Which Social Media Accounts Really Matter and Why. Retrieved October 27, 2018, from https://neilpatel.com/blog/which-social-accounts-matter/

Wayfair Social Media - The Shorty Awards. (2017). Retrieved October 27, 2018, from https://shortyawards.com/10th/wayfair-social-media

Conversion Rate: Real-Life Examples of Success

Metric: Conversion Rate

Category: Conversion

So, you want more customers to sign up for promotional emails? And you also want to decrease the cart abandonment rate on your ecommerce site? Both the sign ups and card abandonment rates are examples of conversions, and in both cases, you will need to figure out ways to increase the conversion rate. How can you do that? Take a look at the real-life examples below for inspiration- various types of conversion rates are detailed:

1.     Company: L’axelle

Goal: Increase clicks for “Add to Cart” button

By changing their ad copy to be more action-oriented, L’axelle increased clicks to their “Add to Cart” button by 93%. The original ad prior to the test is below:

(Patel, 2018).

The test ad is below:

(Patel, 2018).

The new copy in the test ad helped reveal L’axelle as a product that solves a problem.

2.    Company: Basekit

Goal: Redesign Pricing Page

Although it is a good sign when a customer has made it to the pricing page, they are still generally a few steps away from actually making the purchase. Basekit felt they were not performing as well as they could have been on their pricing page and decided to revamp it. Here is what the original pricing page looked like:

(Ruffolo, 2016).

And here is the pricing page after the redesign:

(Ruffolo, 2016).

The green call-out buttons were then easier to recognize after the revamp and the page more organized overall. The redesign led to a 25% increase in conversion rate.

3.     Company: Intuit

Goal: Increase Sales

Intuit implemented a proactive chat tool to a number of areas of their site, and each lead to an increase in conversions. For example, after adding chat to the checkout page, Intuit saw a conversion rate increase of 20%. Sales increased by 211% after introducing chat to their product comparison pages (Ruffolo, 2016). This example demonstrates a more unique way to increase conversions.

4.     Company: WaterFilters.net

Goal: Revamp search site

WaterFilters.net, the leading distributor for water treatment brands, was experiencing issues with their search engine as they added more and more product pages to the site. “Some of

our pages were not indexed at all and the search results seemed to be getting less and less relevant,” explains Director of Business Development Jamin Arvig. WaterFilters.net partnered with Google Site Search in order to correct the problem. Google Site Search enables an enhanced user experience on a company’s site, with the same look and feel of an actual Google Search.

(Google Site Search Case Study..., 2008).

After implementing Google Site Search, the site’s bounce rate decreased by 4% and the conversion rate increased by 11% (Google Site Search Case Study..., 2008). Users on the WaterFilters.net set are now able to find relevant search results from all site content as well as applicable pages from other water filtration sites.

5.     Company: AMD

Goal: Increase social sharing

AMD used ShareThis, a free platform offering free social plugins for websites and blogs (ShareThis, 2018,) to test six variations with different icons and placements on their site. After the test, AMD learned that the best placement for the social sharing buttons was on the left-hand side of site. Their efforts resulted in an increase in social sharing of 3600% (2018)!

At the end of the day, Web analytics can be the keys to exploiting marketing efforts that are not performing to the levels they should be. Conversion rates are important to measure in order to determine success (or failure) on the business goals and KPI’s so changes can be made where applicable. In addition, being able to report statistics on conversion rates will be beneficial when needing to present to company decision-makers.

References

Google Site Search Case Study: Waterfilters.net increased their conversion rate by 11% with Google Site Search. (2008). Retrieved October 20, 2018, from http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/us/sitesearch/pdf/waterfilters.pdf

Patel, N. (2018, June 25). 100 Conversion Optimization Case Studies. Retrieved October 19, 2018, from https://neilpatel.com/blog/100-conversion-optimization-case-studies/

Ruffolo, B. (2016, December 27). 12 Amazing Conversion Rate Optimization Case Studies. Retrieved October 19, 2018, from https://www.impactbnd.com/blog/conversion-rate-optimization-case-studies

ShareThis. (2018). Retrieved October 20, 2018, from https://www.sharethis.com/

Repeat Visitor Rate: Real-Life Examples of Success

Metric: Repeat Visitor Rate

Category: Visit characterization

It is estimated that the cost of acquiring a new customer is five times more than retaining an existing one. (Cheng, 2015). Analyzing customer loyalty and retention through Web analytics is important, and metrics like the repeat visitor rate (RVR) are relevant for these purposes. “RVR is a metric that measures the rate of return visitors to your website. It’ll often be a good indicator of whether your marketing communications and content marketing programs are healthy” (2015). As a general rule of thumb, an RVR under 25% means that website content should be refreshed, 30% means content is engaging to visitors, and 50% or higher is excellent and the company should turn focus to paid distribution to attract more visitors. To find RVR, divide the site’s return visitors by the total number of unique visitors (2015). Below are some real-life examples of how RVR is used:

1.     Geolocation technology is becoming more widely used, especially since a majority of consumers these days have mobile phones. With great levels of accuracy, marketers are now able to target the right customers in the right location at the right time for retailers with brick and mortar stores, which creates increased engagement, conversion and revenue. This technology can help with repeat visitor metrics when an app is combined with user behavioral data. Personalized push notifications can be sent to customers that have been at your location before after they break the geofence near a store. When this location data is added to a customer profile, retailers can track repeat versus occasional visitors. These retailers can reward repeat customers with specialized coupons and offers for their loyalty (Hamer, 2018). This is an example of a non-ecommerce site’s use of measuring return visitors.

2.     Marketers at Contently have a strategy of sorts and they work to consistently see how their efforts are playing out using the RVR metric. They reference Google Analytics monthly to obtain their RVR measures. Along with that, they also look at their “most popular URLs, the content formats these pages offer, content topics that have resonated during this time period, the average time spent on [the] site with these pages, and shares counts and comments” (Cheng, 2015). From there, a 3-6-month content calendar is created to build relationships with their visitors.

From there, the team figures out which content pieces in the content calendar will be distributed (i.e. through social media, email marketing, etc.). Email marketing is touted as their most effective way of increasing RVR, as it is a reminder to users of their content, but also a potential “forwarding vehicle” that can reach an audience that other Contently resources may not reach. Contently sees 16% of visitor web traffic from email subscribers. Here’s a look at where all of their visitors come from:

(Cheng, 2015).

Another piece of the pie (pun intended) that cannot be seen from the above pie chart alone is the average attention time of the users logged onto the site. For Contently, in the first half of 2015 (the year this reference article was written), return visitors on the site “viewed 300 percent more pages per session and logged 61 percent more attention time per session than one-time visitors” (2015).

Repeat visitors are important to any business, as they tend to be more loyal overall. If your business has few repeat visitors, a focus on content and brand development is key. Now, visitors can be found from other places than just a website. Mobile is a huge avenue many businesses should consider as part of their overall Web analytics strategy. 

References

Cheng, R. (2015, August 018). How Loyal Are Your Customers? This Metric Has the Answer. Retrieved October 20, 2018, from https://contently.com/2015/08/18/how-loyal-are-your-customers-this-metric-has-the-answer/

Hamer, R. (2018, October 12). How Geo Campaigns Can Help You Win More Moments of Engagement. Retrieved October 21, 2018, from https://www.business2community.com/marketing/how-geo-campaigns-can-help-you-win-more-moments-of-engagement-02127551