So you’re a retailer, manufacturer or commercial artist. What do you all have in common? You need customers. To get them you’re now doing more than just advertising. You’re probably also publishing your own content – for your own or third-party sites, social media platforms, for brochures, leaflets or point of sale. The list goes on.
The most successful brands are producing such high-quality content that it could compete with a traditional publishing house. The quantity being created is also phenomenal. It has become necessary to satisfy an “always on” mindset whereby the customer or potential customer can access information anytime and anywhere.
But there’s no point in churning out content that will go unseen or turn people off. Brands now need to shift their focus once again towards producing smaller amounts of relevant and valuable content, while being prepared to pay for this content to reach its intended audience.
Understanding supply and demand
We now have a situation where content supply is exploding at such a rate that the likelihood of your content being seen among the melee is declining, regardless of changing algorithms that favour a paid-for approach. It’s simple supply and demand. The average reach for posts on Facebook is at 4.3% for retail brands, which is favourable compared to other industries. Meanwhile, engagement is as low as 2.3% for photo content on Facebook. If you’re a brand with 100,000 followers on Facebook, your average post will be seen by just 2,600 people.
The answer is that you have to pay up. Brands must accept that paid social media is an essential element of their content marketing distribution. To be effective, organic posts need to work with a paid social media strategy.
Quality over quantity
Is it all take, take, take from social media platforms? Brands can actually reap real benefits from investing more in social while doing less.
Facebook’s ad platform, for example, allows you to maximise your budget as it can target the most relevant audience for your message. The result is that your content is read more consistently and is more visible. Other social platforms have got in on the act, offering to take your money for more brand reach. Depending on the audience you’re after, they are definitely worth considering.
It’s now not realistic to expect to build a social community from scratch and make your content visible to all by riding on the back of a growing number of likes or followers. Obviously there is the odd exception, such as that elusive and much-sought after viral hit.
Organic methods of communicating haven’t yet had their day but they do have to be interesting and engaging. However, even with the best writing or videos, a great campaign and a dedicated team, it’s likely you’ll need to spend some money on making sure the audiences you want to reach are actually seeing what you’re doing.
The key message is that you need to work harder to make your content visible, which means focusing on quality over quantity and paid as well as organic social media to reach your online audience.
Steve Sponder is managing director at Headstream
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