When you think social media, you might think of it as the ultimate ground for e-commerce advertising. But the principles of selling goods via social ads can apply to any business, including those of entertainment. That’s right: You can turn social media users into viewers and fans.
Looking at the numbers, the potential of social media marketing is astounding: According to a recent report by GlobalWebIndex, all users between the ages of 16 and 64 spend more than an hour on social media each day. There’s a fine art to cracking the social media advertising code when it comes to turning those browsing hours into conversions, but marketers shouldn’t take it as intimidation.
It’s time to go beyond awareness and turn social media users into performance drivers for tune-in programing and digital sales. Not sure where to start? Follow these three tips to enhance and drive your audience base to your programming, one social ad at a time.
1. Follow Facebook’s New Rules
According to Statista, there are 2.41 billion monthly active users as of the second quarter of 2019 on Facebook; that’s almost one-third of the entire world population. Facebook can be a powerful marketing tool, but it comes with its own gripes.
Facebook’s algorithm, for example, is one of the trickiest things marketers need to navigate while running campaigns. In 2018, the platform made major changes that hit publishers hard: content from friends and family was put at a higher value, and publishers showed up less often as a result. Now, publishers have to focus on more meaningful content, rather than click bait.
Since space in the news feed is limited, it’s important to make sure every ad is optimized for a conversion right off the bat. This means following the new ad formatting rules, which include only three lines of text showing up (with a “Download” or “Learn More” button to view more) and new image requirements of a 4:5 aspect ratio.
What does this mean for you, the entertainment marketer? It means it’s time to follow Facebook’s rules: Make the text of your ads as snappy as possible while still getting your message across. Aside from the algorithm working against you, time is limited on the platform — users are constantly scrolling through their feeds, so make sure you catch their attention. If you want your ads to drive conversions, rather than just blurring in like Facebook wallpaper, give them a clear action (like “Set Your DVR”) and make them as effective as possible.
2. Get Personal
Data is powerful. Data is also an underutilized asset for many marketers. If you want to run successful social campaigns, it’s time to look at your own social data with a magnifying glass.
Why does it matter to get into the nitty gritty? Social media users want personalized experiences — the main purpose of social media, after all, is to share details of our personal lives. While engaging with viewers on their favorite social apps, you need to make sure your ads are sending them a personalized message.
By looking at your own social audience data, you can determine the best language to use when serving an ad to your targeted customer — what are their favorite shows or movies? Where do they watch their content? You can serve ads to those audiences for specific movies or shows, and reach new users by creating a lookalike around your custom audiences. Social media platforms have powerful ways to know exactly who you’re talking to, so use them.
VuPulse works with entertainment marketers to make the most of their social campaigns. Through our Smart URLs, they’re able to create custom post-click audiences across all of their social campaigns, ad types, and target in real-time. (ICYMI, we created 2,500+ custom audiences in the first half of 2019.) As a result, TV marketers are able to keep viewers engaged throughout an entire season, and movie marketers can use for their home release campaigns.
3. Make the Conversion Easy
Social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook have built-in features that can drive traffic directly to your own landing page. These are helpful tools, but why not send users directly to where they want to go and cut out the landing page altogether?.
The majority of social media users view the platforms via mobile apps. This means the consumer experience for your conversion should be quick to load and occur in as few steps as possible. Think about it: If you’re flipping through your social feed and take the time to engage with an ad, don’t you want to take action easily? If you require too much from your audience, you’re going to lose them.
Make the conversion as easy as possible for your targeted customers. Design shouldn’t be compromised, but don’t overwhelm servers with over-complicated UX that will take forever to load. Remember: You have a limited amount of time to capture a user on social media and drive them to convert. Don’t lose them at the last step with a clunky CX!
How VuPulse Can Help
When it comes to data, VuPulse has it all: We can see where your audience is, what their interests are and even what their behaviors are after conversions. Not only can VuPulse meet your audience where it is, but it can determine its past behaviors and help develop a completely personalized marketing experience that will drive views and sales.
Want to know more about how VuPulse can drives views and sales? Drop us a line here.