Tag Archives: marketing

Why Social Media Degrees Are Like Throwing Money Out the Window

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Social media skills have certainly come in demand for job-seekers in the marketing field and many companies are asking that candidates have some knowledge in how to market using social media. Many colleges have been offering classes in the social media arena for a while now. In fact, I’ve taken some of them. However, according to an article in Social Media Today, some colleges have taken it to the next level and have actually created entire social media degrees. An article published by The Center for Digital Education refers to Newberry College which plans on offering social media as a separate major starting in the Fall of 2013.

While the desire to get educated in social media is certainly admirable, any classes except those taught on a broad level with very general studies would be a waste of time and useless, in my opinion. Social media is a hyper-dynamic field in which one has to constantly adapt. Social networking sites are coming and going all the time. What’s hot today is thrown by the wayside tomorrow. Even if the classes focused entirely on the big two – Facebook and Twitter – even those two sites change continuously and while Twitter hasn’t made too many major changes, Facebook is constantly changing what its delivering to people’s newsfeeds. Even seasoned “pros” that have been working in the field for a long time constantly have to learn, evaluate and analyze not only current social media sites but also emerging ones.

To offer a college degree solely dedicated to social media is pointless on several levels. First, for the most part, the people that a university would employ as professors are typically not spring chickens. In fact, according to Wikipedia, the median age of a college professor is 55 years old with “very few people attain(ing) this position prior to the age of 40.” According to one study, more than half of social media users are between the ages of 25-44. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that a 55 year old person isn’t able to “know” social media well enough to teach it to a bunch of 18 year olds. That being said, I believe most of those 18 year olds probably know (and use) social media more than their professors. As far back as 2009, there was a University that was offering a Master’s degree in Social Media. According to Mashable, “some of the students have already described the course as too basic.”

Learning effective marketing, in general, in association with business and writing skills is certainly valuable to a young person planning on going into the marketing field. However, how valuable will the social media knowledge that is taught to them in college be four years later which was, percentage-wise, not being taught by the most educated (social media-wise) professor? I’ve taken classes on social media in which I knew more about it than the professor, which was why I stopped taking them. My goal was to learn, not spend money for a piece of paper that says I’ve learned skills that are already outdated.

Social media changes constantly. Social networks come and go daily. Learning how to effectively market on any given social media platform is a continuous job filled with analysis and adaptation. Trial and error, testing and re-testing, then adapting strategies based on what works NOW, is how most social media professionals “get the job done”. If there was a magic bullet or concrete list of techniques detailing the best way to market on each platform, whoever wrote that would be rich. I equate it to offering a class on how to create viral videos… while the class may exist, there is no formula that can produce this result consistently or, again, whomever discovered that would be rich. Then, of course, if everyone knew how to create viral videos because some magic formula came along teaching them how, none of them would be considered “viral” anymore.

There is no way social media can exist as its own major and be relevant 4 years later. My advice would be to use college to fill up on effective marketing, statistics, and business courses, in general, and take extra time, on your own, doing what you’re already doing anyways – using social networks. Read and learn on your own from the people who are willing to share their knowledge and expertise online (of which there are many) and are taking the time to keep up with current trends, techniques and changes in the world of social media. You could try and secure an internship at a company that specializes in social media to gain some practical, current, working knowledge of social media marketing.

I guarantee that you will come out of college prepared to enter the job market and will not have wasted 4 years (and who knows how much money) just to learn at the end that you haven’t learned anything.

Facebook Promoted Posts: Are They Right For You?

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Facebook’s Edgerank algorithm—the formula used to determine the order content appears in a given newsfeed based on which content is deemed most relevant to that user—may make the Facebook experience more seamless for casual browsers, but it’s a challenge for businesses that harness the social media platform as part of a marketing strategy. After all, thanks to Edgerank, each post on Facebook only makes it onto the newsfeed of about 12-17% of its fans. The fans that do see it are more likely to be those that have already chosen to visit your page, or that regularly interact with your posts. Edgerank’s feedback-loop effect makes it harder than ever to reach and engage consumers that don’t self-select your business’s content.

To counter those daunting odds, Facebook recently introduced a new service allowing business pages with greater than 400 “likes” to pay a fee to promote individual posts. This new feature allows a page owner to select a single post, which could be a status update, photo, video, question, or offer, and pay a premium to increase the reach for that post beyond the circle of fans that are already engaged with your content. Not only that, but promoted posts are supposedly more likely to be seen in the newsfeeds of friends of fans, too.

Promoted posts have a one-time, pre-set budget that remains in place for the life of the post.  While setting up a promoted post, you will be asked to choose a budget from a suite of options that includes the post’s estimated reach at each payment level. The promotion can be suspended or stopped at any time regardless of whether your maximum budget has been used. Promoted posts do have some targeting capabilities, including geographical location and language, but these can only be applied to posts that are less than three days old.

Sounds Great—but Do They Work?

I set out to test the promoted posts feature on my blog’s fan page (which has 613 fans) to see how it performed versus a normal, “organic” post. I’d recently created a page on my blog that consists of a dedicated list of available educational events and conferences for automotive dealers. I shared this blog page via a status update on May 23rd, prior to the launch of Promoted Posts. The post performed as expected, reaching roughly 13% of my page’s fans with a marginal viral reach (a measure of how many impressions came from non-fans who encountered the post because a fan of the page shared or interacted with the post).

  

Keep in mind that my Facebook page isn’t particularly active, nor do I put too much effort into engaging my fans, which limits the reach of posts. I mainly use the page to post blog articles, so I don’t expect high engagement, but these statistics are in line with the average reach reported by others.

On June 2, I decided to test out the new Promoted Posts feature. Upon creating the new post, the only option presented to me was to pay $5 to reach an estimated 300 people.

The post I promoted was essentially the same as the previous one – a status update which included an external link to the same page on my blog. I did no other social media promotion at all for this post and let it run for the full three days.

Here were the results:

  

As you can see, the post exceeded the estimated paid reach (with 324 rather than 300 paid impressions), and it also reached 1200% more non-fans (13 vs. 164) via viral sharing, substantially increasing exposure to my fans’ social networks. Organic displays also increased by almost double (70 vs. 132). The promoted post didn’t increase engagement but, the post itself wasn’t really designed to encourage engagement. I also didn’t see a noticeable difference in traffic to the external page on my blog, with the average number of daily visitors to that specific page remaining roughly the same.

Two interesting side notes: First, Facebook defines paid results as “the number of people who saw your page post in an Ad or Sponsored Story.” But when signing up for the service, Facebook never mentioned that my promoted post could potentially be displayed via an Ad (on the right of the newsfeed) versus as a Sponsored Story (within the newsfeed itself). In my estimation, Ads constitute weaker exposure than Sponsored Stories, but I have to assume that at least some of the paid exposure for my promoted post came via Ads.

Second, as mentioned previously, I was initially only given the option to reach 300 people for $5. However, when I looked into promoting another post following my initial trial, I was given a second option to reach 700 people for $10, as well. This tells me that Facebook underestimated the results they could deliver.

Are Promoted Posts for You?

As in any form of advertisement, you must have clearly defined goals before spending any money. Here are some questions you should ask yourself before making a decision one way or another regarding promoted posts.

1.    How large is your page’s fan base? Keep in mind that the larger your fan base, the more potential reach each promoted post will have, which will result in a higher upfront cost.

2.    Are these actual customers, or are they a random assortment of individuals who were collected in an effort to grow the number of fans at all costs? I consider fans to be relevant if they are potential or existing customers who could realistically do business with you—whether that’s via sales, service, or parts—and whose social networks will, in all likelihood, include more relevant people. In the case of dealerships, for example, it does you no good to increase exposure to people outside your PMA, vendors, or anyone else who doesn’t have the ability to spend money with you. Note, however, that the geo-targeting option does allow you to more efficiently reach relevant fans.

3.    What is your goal for promoting a particular post? Is it to increase engagement? Increase exposure for an offer or event? Share important information with your fans? Lead people to an external website or conversion page?

In my opinion, promoting a post just for the sake of promoting it is ill-advised. If you have clear goals in mind, you should be able to accurately track whether your money was spent wisely. Did you actually increase engagement, and was that engagement by new people rather than those who already regularly engage with you? Did more people take advantage of your offer? Did you receive more traffic (via Facebook) to the external link you included in your post?

If you’ve built your fan page organically via your website, in-store signage, or via inclusion in other marketing channels, I could see a promoted post helping to jumpstart your page by potentially increasing your fans via increased exposure to THEIR networks. Keep in mind that the majority of the people you will be reaching already like your page so, in my opinion, the greatest potential of Facebook Promoted Posts is in its ability to extend your exposure beyond your fans and into their social networks.

That being said, a well-thought-out promoted post with clearly defined goals has the potential to increase reach and revenues—all at a relatively low cost.

via the June 2012 edition of the 3 Birds Marketing newsletter

Foursquare Launches Local Updates for Businesses

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If you haven’t heard, foursquare announced yesterday the launch of what they’re calling “Local Updates”.

What are these and how can you use them?

Essentially, Local Updates will allow businesses to push messages to consumers who have either “liked” their business or frequent it. Updates can include things like specials, pictures of a new car (or a used car you just got in stock), it can include coupons, service specials, or whatever else you’d like your customers to see.

Your customers will be able to see these updates while in the same city as you. While certainly not as geo-targeted as it could be (like in the auto mall or within 10 miles of your dealership), being in the same city is a start.

In the past, the only way (or type) of message you could put out there for consumers on foursquare were “special offers” which required a check-in. While you can still make an offer to a customer, the ability to simply provide updates to consumers is another way of engaging them and staying top of mind.

Here’s an example of what an update would look like:

With nearly 1,000,000 business pages claimed and 10,000,000 users, foursquare is simply something you cannot afford to ignore. It’s fairly low-maintenance when set up and, since its free, the benefits vastly outweigh the possibility of lost business. Engaging your customers (or potential customers) is something that’s not only necessary but integral to increasing customer loyalty and retention.

The Local Updates feature will be rolled out to businesses that have claimed their page this week sometime so stay tuned.

Here is a brief video intro created by foursquare:

 

Facebook Likes: Don’t Get Scammed

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One of the easiest metrics dealers use to judge the success of their Facebook page is how many people like it. It’s also the most irrelevant.

I’ve said this many times and I’ll keep repeating it:

You’re better off having 1,000 fans to your page that can actually do business with you than 10,000 fans that will never spend a cent.

How do you expect to get ROI from your social media efforts if all your social media fans/followers are in Thailand? (Unless, of course, you have a booming export business to Thailand) The answer is, you won’t.

Also, many companies are delivering “fake” fans anyways through shady methods. This article by AllFacebook.com illustrates some of the methods these companies use.

Having a lot of Facebook fans that you bought is meaningless and a waste of money. Companies that prey on dealers with a service that increases “likes” to your Facebook page with random people are scam artists. It’s a waste of money and either these companies don’t realize that (which means they are incompetent and shouldn’t be in the social media business) or they do realize that (which means they are intentionally selling a service that has no value).

Dealers, please don’t fall into the trap of equating quantity with success. If you build your fan base organically with customers in your market, your social media marketing efforts will bear fruit.

If you “buy” fans, you’re actually sabotaging your own Facebook page and social media marketing efforts and you’ll only accomplish one thing:

Do you want to make money or be able to say “mine is bigger than yours”? You decide.

(P.S. There’s a great conversation over in the DealerRefresh forums talking about this.)

(P.S.S. Yes, I love the gorilla graphic.)

Facebook Promoted Posts

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Facebook’s Edgerank algorithm—the formula used to determine the order content appears in a given newsfeed based on which content is deemed most relevant to that user—may make the Facebook experience more seamless for casual browsers, but it’s a challenge for businesses that harness the social media platform as part of a marketing strategy. After all, thanks to Edgerank, each post on Facebook only makes it onto the newsfeed of about 12-17% of its fans. The fans that do see it are more likely to be those that have already chosen to visit your page, or that regularly interact with your posts. Edgerank’s feedback-loop effect makes it harder than ever to reach and engage consumers that don’t self-select your business’s content.

To counter those daunting odds, Facebook recently introduced a new service allowing business pages with greater than 400 “likes” to pay a fee to promote individual posts. This new feature allows a page owner to select a single post, which could be a status update, photo, video, question, or offer, and pay a premium to increase the reach for that post beyond the circle of fans that are already engaged with your content. Not only that, but promoted posts are supposedly more likely to be seen in the newsfeeds of friends of fans, too.

Promoted posts have a one-time, pre-set budget that remains in place for the life of the post. While setting up a promoted post, you will be asked to choose a budget from a suite of options that includes the post’s estimated reach at each payment level. The promotion can be suspended or stopped at any time regardless of whether your maximum budget has been used. Promoted posts do have some targeting capabilities, including geographical location and language, but these can only be applied to posts that are less than three days old.

Sounds Great—but Do They Work?

I set out to test the promoted posts feature on my blog’s fan page (which has 613 fans) to see how it performed versus a normal, “organic” post. I’d recently created a page on my blog that consists of a dedicated list of available educational events and conferences for automotive dealers. I shared this blog page via a status update on May 23rd, prior to the launch of Promoted Posts. The post performed as expected, reaching roughly 13% of my page’s fans with a marginal viral reach (a measure of how many impressions came from non-fans who encountered the post because a fan of the page shared or interacted with the post).

Keep in mind that my Facebook page isn’t particularly active, nor do I put too much effort into engaging my fans, which limits the reach of posts. I mainly use the page to post blog articles, so I don’t expect high engagement, but these statistics are in line with the average reach reported by others.

On June 2, I decided to test out the new Promoted Posts feature. Upon creating the new post, the only option presented to me was to pay $5 to reach an estimated 300 people.
The post I promoted was essentially the same as the previous one – a status update which included an external link to the same page on my blog. I did no other social media promotion at all for this post and let it run for the full three days.

Here were the results:

As you can see, the post exceeded the estimated paid reach (with 324 rather than 300 paid impressions), and it also reached 1200% more non-fans (13 vs. 164) via viral sharing, substantially increasing exposure to my fans’ social networks. Organic displays also increased by almost double (70 vs. 132). The promoted post didn’t increase engagement but, the post itself wasn’t really designed to encourage engagement. I also didn’t see a noticeable difference in traffic to the external page on my blog, with the average number of daily visitors to that specific page remaining roughly the same.

Two interesting side notes: First, Facebook defines paid results as “the number of people who saw your page post in an Ad or Sponsored Story.” But when signing up for the service, Facebook never mentioned that my promoted post could potentially be displayed via an Ad (on the right of the newsfeed) versus as a Sponsored Story (within the newsfeed itself). In my estimation, Ads constitute weaker exposure than Sponsored Stories, but I have to assume that at least some of the paid exposure for my promoted post came via Ads.

Second, as mentioned previously, I was initially only given the option to reach 300 people for $5. However, when I looked into promoting another post following my initial trial, I was given a second option to reach 700 people for $10, as well. This tells me that Facebook underestimated the results they could deliver.

Are Promoted Posts for You?

As in any form of advertisement, you must have clearly defined goals before spending any money. Here are some questions you should ask yourself before making a decision one way or another regarding promoted posts.

1. How large is your page’s fan base? Keep in mind that the larger your fan base, the more potential reach each promoted post will have, which will result in a higher upfront cost.

2. Are these actual customers, or are they a random assortment of individuals who were collected in an effort to grow the number of fans at all costs? I consider fans to be relevant if they are potential or existing customers who could realistically do business with you—whether that’s via sales, service, or parts—and whose social networks will, in all likelihood, include more relevant people. In the case of dealerships, for example, it does you no good to increase exposure to people outside your PMA, vendors, or anyone else who doesn’t have the ability to spend money with you. Note, however, that the geo-targeting option does allow you to more efficiently reach relevant fans.

3. What is your goal for promoting a particular post? Is it to increase engagement? Increase exposure for an offer or event? Share important information with your fans? Lead people to an external website or conversion page?

In my opinion, promoting a post just for the sake of promoting it is ill-advised. If you have clear goals in mind, you should be able to accurately track whether your money was spent wisely. Did you actually increase engagement, and was that engagement by new people rather than those who already regularly engage with you? Did more people take advantage of your offer? Did you receive more traffic (via Facebook) to the external link you included in your post?

If you’ve built your fan page organically via your website, in-store signage, or via inclusion in other marketing channels, I could see a promoted post helping to jumpstart your page by potentially increasing your fans via increased exposure to THEIR networks. Keep in mind that the majority of the people you will be reaching already like your page so, in my opinion, the greatest potential of Facebook Promoted Posts is in its ability to extend your exposure beyond your fans and into their social networks.

That being said, a well-thought-out promoted post with clearly defined goals has the potential to increase reach and revenues—all at a relatively low cost.

[Article originally published in the June 2012 issue of the 3 Birds Marketing e-newsletter]