‘Turns out there are some successful brand social media strategies you bloggers might want to pay attention to! As a blogger, it is important that you cultivate a strong personal or blog identity in order to grow your fan base. This is often a long process, with many different facets. We talk about creating great (and regular!) content on the Bloggers’ Lounge, but you also have to consider SEO, and Social Media strategies. Big brands from John Lewis, Marc Jacobs, to Tesco Mobile, all have huge social media budgets alongside their general marketing strategies, that lead to greater referrals and fans for their brands. You might not have a multi-million pound budget, but there are some social media examples you can emulate. Here’s some of our top insights and tips to get you started:
1. What are your goals?
You need to ask yourself this question. What are you hoping to achieve? Brands have to set goals for when they undertake a new Social Media campaign, so they can report back to their scary bosses. For them, it’s all about proving the efficiency and value of their Social Media shenanigans. For you, it’s about maximising your blog’s potential. Do you want more followers? Then set yourself a target! Maybe it is engagement you are really after? There are tools that you can use to measure all of this. Some of our favourites at The Bloggers’ Lounge are Facebook Insights, Social Bro, and Pinterest Analytics.
2. Maximise Social Media Traffic to your Blog
Keep you eyes peeled on any Social Media traffic coming to your blog. If you are a relatively new blog, or a blog that isn’t ranking in the first few Google pages for major keywords (more about these here), you might do better to push your blog through Social Media. Huge air travel company KLM, have recently reported that they make €25 million a year from social media referrals. By setting yourself ‘goals’ in Google Analytics (KLM’s may have been ‘flight bookings to Amsterdam’, yours might be getting a fan to visitor to sign up to your blog newsletter!), you can keep track of where your traffic is coming from.
3. Make Friends!
It’s a dog eat dog world out there, for brands AND bloggers. Some of the most successful brands on social media are often the ones you would least expect. We all get by with a little help from our friends, so play nicely and you will earn a friendly reputation with other bloggers. Tesco Mobile are very successful in providing customer service, but also engaging a large audience on Twitter with their witty online persona. Check out this Tesco Mobile master class (featuring Jaffa Cakes and Yorkshire tea!) here.
4. Content Focus
Brands often have large Social Media budgets, and pump money in to making their social content visible to a larger audience. However, if certain posts under-perform, a savvy Social Media manager will make sure this budget is reassigned to posts that are working. Brands have to make sure the social media content they are churning out is delivering on their goals, so culling flailing content and focussing on what works is a wise move. Bloggers can do the same! Have a look at your Social Media measurement tools and Google Analytics to see the amount of clicks, referrals, reach, and engagement your tweets, pins, or posts receive. If you sense a particular type of content works better: do it more!
5. Take Risks
There will be times when you want to stand out from all the other fashion/beauty/travel (etc) bloggers out there. How do brands with internationally-known competitors stand out in a saturated market? Let’s learn a lesson from Marc Jacob’s Social Media team who nailed a campaign entitled #castmemarc. Executing a slick Instagram-Twitter wide campaign to find grass-roots faces of the brand, Marc Jacobs turned social media in to currency and engaged in an audience far beyond their luxury fan base. What can bloggers take from this? You don’t have to play by the rules, or appeal to your traditional audience. Be yourself, and don’t feel constrained by your blog genre!
We hope you found these brand-based Social Media tips useful! Let us know if you have any tips of your own, or if you have any questions!
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