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Developing your brand voice on social media: 5 mistakes to avoid
19 Jul 2019
We're entering the age of technological revolutions and massive diffusion of technologies connecting people around the globe. The constant development of mobile devices gave birth to new forms of communication and 24/7 connectivity in social networks.
Image credit: Saulo Mohana on Unsplash.
They play a significant role in changing human consciousness and shaping new customer behaviour patterns.
In other words, they are making our society more “digital”. So, it’s crucial for business success to understand the hidden influences of user’s decision-making process in the modern digital space.
Being deeply digital
Jacques du Bruyn 3 Jul 2019
The influence of Generation Z – the first generation of true digital natives – is expanding and influencing the social media trends too. According to McKinsey, members of Gen Z are people born from 1995 to 2010 who from their earliest youth have been exposed to the internet, social networks and mobile systems.
There is no chance to increase ROI for your business success today if you don't spread your voice in the digital world and social networks, in particular. Businesses should adjust their marketing strategies to the needs and requirements of Gen Z since this fastly growing part of our society is dictating the future trends of the digital space and, therefore, new marketing trends too.
Mistake #1. Underestimating the power of social networks
Social media penetration is ever-increasing worldwide. According to Statista, the pervasiveness of social media will increase to over 3.02 billion users worldwide by 2021.
Considering all other pieces of the marketing pie, social media marketing is a big slice today. The right content published in the right moment will help you build customer loyalty and bring plenty of other benefits to the business. You should just learn how to optimise your content to the customer’s needs.
Social networks are a powerful tool of engagement able to spread the word of your brand around the globe within minutes. Social media is also helpful in user experience research. Mistake #1 is underestimating the power of social networks and not making enough effort in producing high-quality content.
Mistake #2. Not understanding your target audience
Explore your target audience as you’d like to explore the mind of your loved one. Discover their wants and habits.
Google Analytics can give you a good insight into your target audience peculiarities. Consequently, you’ll get a better understanding of people you’re creating social media content for.
Moreover, you shouldn’t stop your customer persona research after investigating the cold data. Stats are an old good friend, however, don't fully trust them. Sometimes, you should act like a marketer from the 19th century: check information “manually”.
Exploring your random follower's profile “manually”, not by using any analytics tool, you will gain a new view at your customer persona. You will get a specific kind of information, which you wouldn’t get from any automatically generated stats.
Boujee Bowl. That’s it. That’s the tweet. pic.twitter.com/9Ujc3syFlc
— NandosSA (@NandosSA) July 11, 2019
It’s almost transparent, but it is still important for effective marketing. It feels like your customer’s mood.
On the fans’ profiles, you can learn about their lifestyles, tastes, habits and even food preferences. That will help you adjust your content to the needs and peculiarities of these people. You might be surprised, but such data can give birth to the unique marketing idea that will be understood by your target audience.
Mistake #3. Not offering real value to people
Don’t underestimate people. They understand if your content is good or not.
No matter, whether your prospective customers are skateboarders, housewives or business people: individuals always feel the quality intuitively. Be interested in producing great content offering value to people.
The content bringing value doesn’t mean only tips, news or talks about new product features. You can post user-generated content. It shows appreciation for fans that reached out and connected with you.
The “value” I’m talking about is the brand’s attention to a customer. Let people feel that a company cares about how they feel using a product or service. The more you engage with your fans, the more likely they are to share new photos with you.
User-generated content will enrich the brand’s social media page with the fresh visuals, give more engagement and start the interaction chain between a company and its customers.
One more tip on the social media content: dear entrepreneurs, don’t try to produce visuals for the cheapest price. Bad product images are almost equal to the brand’s fail on social networks. The better your product “looks”, the more likely your brand’s voice will be heard by others on the social channels.
Mistake #4. Not adding a pinch of novelty
Life means dynamics. Your marketing should reflect the changes your customers are experiencing. Thus, a marketing strategy needs to be timely injected by a dose of changes. Otherwise, you will not survive in the market.
If you do not accept changes, the changes will not accept you. Experiment with the new approaches, try to constantly add a pinch of novelty into your social media content.
To be wrong is human, all of us make mistakes. Don’t be afraid of doing them. You should take risks if you want to develop the unique and memorable ‘voice’ of your brand.
Mistake #5. Not being aware of "malicious tags" on Instagram
Since Instagram is the giant among other social networks, let’s pay special attention to it. I’d like to share with you truly new information on the Instagram system, which I’ve crystallised after providing marketing services for companies across different industries.
There are different scenarios of what may happen further. The worst scenario: your profile will be completely banned. The better scenario: you’ll be able to post on Instagram, but you’ll not be able not to add new hashtags for a period of time ranging from one to two weeks up to three to four months. You will not be able also to edit the recently published posts anymore.
Consequently, you may lose the chance to get new followers that could come through new hashtags. Moreover, Instagram may start sending less traffic to your profile because it’s blacklisted.
What to do? The only thing is to wait until the Instagram system will update a ‘blacklist’ after some time and give the blacklisted profiles another chance to function as previously.
If you’ve faced such a situation, I recommend not to stop your activity on Instagram, just be careful using the hashtags.
As I’ve mentioned before, err is human. But to make mistakes and learn from them is the privilege of the smart human. I hope my experience gained from making these mistakes will help you improve your social media marketing strategy and establish the distinguishable and beautiful voice of your brand. The voice that will give pleasure to the target audience interacting with your content.
