Stone tools and hand drills aren’t quite what they used to be. Sure, the Neolithic man may have found them to be cutting edge, but go into your local Home Depot or Lowes and ask for a hammerstone and you will most certainly get some strange looks. The contents in our toolboxes change over the years as we replace the old devices with faster more efficient products. The same concept applies to social media marketing tools; being number one in the phone book does not have the same appeal that it used to. Now, it’s ROI, SEO, social media marketing, analytics, and connecting and engaging with customers that matter. Let’s take a look at some of the social media tools you need in your marketing toolbox in 2014.
Social Media Marketing: Climb the Ladder to Success
According to a survey conducted by Adobe last year, most marketers are concerned with connecting with their customers (easier said than done). Connection with customers relies on conversation, and conversations typically work best when both people are contributing. Screaming from the mountain top sounds good in theory (it reaches a lot of people), but in practice all those people in the village below (i.e. your customers) will probably be lighting their torches and sharpening their pitchforks. Don’t fall victim to a sharpened pitchfork. Instead, try building a ladder, go down into the village, and interact with your clientele. Social media marketing is that ladder, and it will be the most important domain to marketers over the next three years. Use every social media platform (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.), but be sure to focus on the platform that gives you the best access to your clients.
Social Video: Add Some Color to the Campaign
Video production has soared as cameras have decreased in size and increased image quality. Pretty much every phone now has a video camera, and with apps like Instagram and Vine, people are posting more and more. A can of paint can do wonders to a room; it can make it feel bright, warm or cool, and can add aesthetic value. Videos can add a similar amount of flair to your website. Images are worth a thousand words, and at 30 frames per second for 2 minutes, that’s roughly 4 million words. Reading 4 million words in 2 minutes is impossible (Howard Berg holds the World Record for words read per minute with 25,000). Clients will never read that much; they want information quickly, and if they can’t get it in just a few seconds, they will go elsewhere. A 2 minute video can get the point across effectively while creating a more enjoyable user experience. Social media marketing and video production will be essential to expanding your company’s digital presence and exposure in 2014. However, they represent a starting point and are a means to an end, not the end itself. Even the best social media marketing tools require proper training which we will explore in our next post. Stay tuned!
