Brian Meert's Blog, page 66

How to Handle Negative Comments on Social Media Following These 5 Amazing Examples

AUG. 19, 2020

Bench Accounting / Unsplash

If you run a business that is active on social media, it’s almost inevitable that you’ll receive a negative comment sooner or later. Whether or not you feel the negativity is justified, you’ll need a plan in place to respond. 

Many brands completely ignoring negative comments — this is a big mistake. It signals disrespect to the customer, which negatively impacts others’ perception of your brand, too. 

The only response worse than no response is to delete negative comments. Deleting a comment from a disgruntled customer often fans the flames and makes the situation worse. There are exceptions, such as if the comment is offensive, profanity-laden, violent, or threatening. But in most cases, you should resist the temptation to delete. 

Every now and then, you’ll see amazing brand responses to negative social media comments. Let’s look at a few of them and consider what we can learn from their example.

Show Empathy 

According to Psychology Today, empathy is defined as “the ability to recognize, understand, and share the thoughts and feelings of another person.” People have a basic need to be heard and understood. Therefore, when you receive a complaint, it’s essential to empathize with how the customer is feeling. 

Empathy is one of the simplest and most effective ways to diffuse anger, frustration, or annoyance so that you can find a suitable solution. Here’s a fantastic example from Starbucks: 

It’s worth mentioning that empathy is not only reserved for major problems. It can also go a long way with issues that may seem relatively trivial, such as the above customer who couldn’t get her favorite drink due to an item being out of stock. 

Notice how the customer service representative validates the customer’s feelings by saying “how frustrating” before explaining how she intends to address the problem. The representative signing off by name also makes the exchange feel more personal. 

An empathic, personalized response shows that the brand cares about customers, and in many cases, that is all that’s needed to get them back on your side. 

Acknowledge the Error

We’re all human, and no business can expect to get things right every single time. What matters is not perfection but owning up to it when you make a mistake.

Stitch Fix is a clothing subscription delivery service that makes a point of responding to every review on social media, positive or negative. This customer was unhappy with the content of her delivery and felt that the stylist had not understood her requirements: 

Notice the personalized language in the response “we’d love another chance to get to know you.” This type of reply shows care and the willingness to adapt to get it right next time. Acknowledging that you failed to live up to expectations on this occasion humanizes your brand and goes a long way towards defusing the customer’s annoyance. 

In addition, thanking the customer for bringing the issue to the comdpany’s attention shows respect. Customer feedback is valuable, even when it isn’t positive. By valuing your customers’ opinions, you increase the odds that they will give you another chance.

Finally, offering the customer two options (fixing the problem or canceling the account) puts Stitch Fix back in control. 

Stand by Your Values

You don’t have to agree with negative comments, and there are occasions when you shouldn’t.

A UK Post Office employee known simply as Courtney went viral in June this year with her eviscerating responses to bigoted comments on Twitter. The organization ran a Pride Month campaign, showcasing the achievements of its LGBTQ+ staff. Among the many positive responses were a handful of negative and even hateful ones. 

The social media team, led by Courtney, pulled no punches in standing up for colleagues and equal rights:

 

Values are at the heart of your brand identity. Whether you’re speaking up for LGBTQ rights, gender equality, environmental issues, or something else entirely, don’t be afraid to hold your ground when it matters. 

The Post Office’s responses during its Pride Month campaign is a perfect example of how to push back against hateful comments without becoming aggressive in return. 

Don’t Take Yourself Too Seriously

People love pointing out when brands make mistakes on their social media accounts. If you accidentally missed a typo, made a spelling mistake, or forgot to correct a grammatical error in a post, you can guarantee that your followers will be quick to gleefully point it out.

Indian fashion company Allen Solly mistakenly announced on a billboard that a new product was “comming soon [sic].” A follower snapped a picture and put it on Twitter, pointing out the spelling mistake. The brand’s response was swift and hilarious:

The company owned up to its mistake without making too big a deal of an ultimately harmless typo while adding a dash of humor into the mix. By implying the old-fashioned school punishment of writing lines, the brand makes fun of itself and gives its audience a smile. Notice the use of the winking face emoji to indicate a shared joke. 

While you must take larger issues seriously, small mistakes are often best handled with playful irreverence. Showing that you don’t take yourself overly seriously can endear you to your customer base. A simple “oops, our bad, thanks for letting us know” would have been fine, but nowhere near as memorable. 

You can avoid getting called out for embarrassing spelling errors by using a spelling and grammar checker before you hit “publish.” But if you do let one slip through the net, following Allen Solly’s example will keep you in your customers’ good books.

Give a Gesture of Goodwill

Depending on what your business does, it won’t always be possible or appropriate to respond to negative feedback by giving the customer something for free. But if you are able to, a gesture of goodwill achieves two things: 

It helps repair the relationship with customers by showing that you care about their feedback and experience. 
A freebie makes it more likely that they will return, giving you the opportunity to show that their bad experience was a one-off and that you can do better. 

Check out this example from London restaurant Yolk:

Yolk does four things in this short exchange: apologizes, explains how the problem happened, offers a freebie as a gesture of goodwill, and shows that the company values the feedback. 

If you want a disgruntled customer to give you a second chance, the best way to get them back through your doors is to give them an incentive. In the long run, the cost of keeping a customer happy through a gesture of goodwill is far outweighed by the lifetime value of the customer. 

You might be wondering if you shouldn’t make these offers privately to prevent an influx of complaints from people looking for freebies. It’s true that a very small number of unscrupulous people will make bogus complaints just to get free stuff, but these people are in the minority. 

By publicly offering a gesture of goodwill in the face of a complaint, you show your customers that you really care about offering an amazing experience, and that is worth far more than the occasional cost of giving something away. 

Handling Negative Social Media Comments Like a Pro

There’s definitely an art to handling negative social media comments in the right way. It’s a difficult balancing act because there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Different brands, customer bases, and problems will all require different responses. 

Whatever methods of handling negative comments you choose, make sure your brand’s voice and values are front and center. How do you want your customers to perceive you? Does the response you’re about to give enhance that desired perception? If not, approach the negative comment in a different way. 

Nobody enjoys getting negative comments on social media or anywhere else, but they are an occasional part of doing business. Presumably you want your brand to be seen as honest, trustworthy, and customer-focused. Ignoring or deleting negative comments will have the opposite effect, so resist the temptation no matter how strong it is. 

With inspiration from these examples, a strong sense of your brand’s voice and values, and a dash of creativity, you’ll soon be handling those negative comments like a pro. 

Good luck! 

Written by Jess Amy Dixon

Facebook Removes Multicultural Affinity from Ad Targeting Options

AUG. 18, 2020

Austin Distel / Unsplash

Facebook announced that it is removing multicultural affinity from its ad targeting options. Examples of multicultural affinity targeting includes “African American,” “Hispanic,” and “Asian American.”

According to Facebook, the change simplifies ad targeting options. 

“As part of our latest efforts to simplify and streamline our targeting options, we’ve identified cases where advertisers — of all sizes and industries — rarely use various targeting options.”

Targeting segments in line for removal include those that are infrequently used, duplicates, or overly granular. For example, Facebook is omitting the targeting option “Key West” since a better alternative, “Key West, Florida,” is already available. 

However, Facebook did mention that it is removing affinity targeting to prevent misuse:

“We’re removing multicultural affinity segments and encouraging advertisers to use other targeting options such as language or culture to reach people that are interested in multicultural content. We continue to support product solutions for multicultural marketing while guarding against their potential for misuse.”

This isn’t the first time Facebook removed ad options due to manipulation by bad actors. Back in 2017, the social media giant removed self-reported targeting after ProPublica revealed that the feature has been used to discriminate and promote hate speech. In 2018, Facebook prevented advertisers from targeting users according to their sexual orientation. In 2019, the company rolled out Special Ad Categories, a required classification for housing, credit, and employment ads with limited targeting options. 

Despite removing thousands of ad targeting segments during the past two years, including race, ethnicity, and religion, the social media company assures advertisers that changes do not affect ad campaigns, that alternative targeting options reap the same results. 

“These changes will not impact the vast majority of advertisers and most targeting options remain available…we will guide advertisers to options that are similar to ones that have been removed and that should provide comparable performance.”

Advertisers can learn more about prohibited advertising practices by visiting Facebook’s Ad Policies. 

Written by Anne Felicitas

How Topic Targeting Can Improve Display Advertising

AUG. 17, 2020

Benjamin Dada / Unsplash

There are quite a few added factors that can help in the optimum growth of your business while following a digital marketing strategy. Depending on the company you choose to work with, the kind of strategies you build will be different. However, every digital marketing agency tends to focus on growing through innovative methods — topic targeting is one of these methods. 

With the technological advancements that we fall witness to with every passing day, it can be difficult to keep up. However, once you do, you’ll be able to realize that every new advancement is capable of changing the way you look at business altogether: a deeper understanding of the customer’s thought process, behavior, and even expectations from a product or service that they choose to invest their money in.

Where Does the Process of Topic Targeting Come in?

The concept of topic targeting comes from Google Adwords. To put it simply, topic targeting allows you to target more than just keywords and competitive placements. It allows you to target customers based on whole topics. 

The Google Display Network comprises different websites, videos, and applications. While displaying your advertisements across these platforms, you need to reach the audience that’s capable of developing an interest in your products. 

Topic targeting is a process that helps you reach your niche. It’s meant to lead you with impressions, not necessarily conversions. For example, if you’re advertising a publishing house that deals with novels and short stories, you’re highly likely to place your products under the category of books and literature. However, topic targeting doesn’t limit your growth into one field. You can also explore the arts and entertainment category. The ultimate goal of topic targeting is to explore as many options as possible to create a high level of impressions for your products. It’s more about brand awareness rather than going to the next step of your buyer persona.  

Is It Essential to Use Topic Targeting as Part of Your Digital Marketing Strategy?

If the ultimate goal of topic targeting is to gain impressions and not clicks or conversions is the process worth it? Can’t you simply target all topics? Although that might be your first impression, topic targeting can be extremely beneficial for the overall set up of a digital marketing campaign. 

Topic targeting is beyond just digital marketing. Topic targeting is capable of providing a foundation for your digital marketing strategy. While working out benefits in the long run, it gives the company you’re working with an idea of which industry you intend to target. This allows you to improve the entire content marketing performance of your business.

What Are the Ultimate Benefits of Implementing Topic Targeting in AdWords?

There are many benefits attached to the implementation of topic targeting in Google Adwords. 

1. You Can Overcome Keyword Issues

To build a flawless digital marketing campaign, it’s extremely important to understand customer intent. Every keyword holds a different meaning for every user. For example, if you’re promoting a company that works with salt production, you could have a difficult time advertising your product. A 2010 movie is called Salt. There is an influencer and Turkish chef called Salt Bae, and there’s even a city in Utah called Salt Lake City. While one user could be looking for your product, there might be another that would rather watch the 2010 film. Topic targeting allows you to reach the audience that’s more likely to be interested in your products or services. 

Depending on the product you’re offering, you can place your product in the category that suits it best. Moreover, topic targeting allows you to target negative topics as well, the categories that you don’t want your products to be associated with. For example, if you’re selling a form of salt, you can consider arts and entertainment to be a negative topic since you do not want to associate your brand with the movie Salt. 

Although topic targeting isn’t an important step toward gaining conversions, it helps in creating an impression on the right audience. Once you’re able to make your niche even consider your product, you’re on the right track toward a sale. 

2. Experimenting Can Help You Understand Your Customers Better

One of the most important parts of exploring the different options available in digital marketing is experimenting with the options you have. Topic targeting allows you to know the category that suits your business best according to functionality and target audience. 

If you’ve been running a business for a while and have worked with a digital marketing agency before, you must be well aware of the fact that experimenting with your strategy is a crucial part of establishing your ground over the digital network. 

Similarly, while topic targeting your Google Adwords account, you will gain further insight into which category works best for you and which doesn’t. By diving into the different categories available, you will be able to understand which promotional tactics could use more of your budget and where you can perform budget cuts.

3. You Can Target High-Traffic Websites on a Lower Budget

Targeting your audience through a high-traffic website sounds like a dream,  but what if the simple process of topic targeting is capable of lowering the money that goes out of your wallet? For example, if your business works with visa consultations, you will find yourself fitting ideally into the tourism sector. While setting up your advertisements over high-traffic platforms such as YouTube or The Guardian, all you need to do is fit yourself into the category of travel and tourism. Not only are you able to reach your niche audience this way, but you are also minimizing your spend. 

4. Expansion Becomes a Heavy Opportunity

Digital advertising can seem to be overwhelming at first: You never know what could work out best for your business. For example, when you consider a business that works with visa consultations, you consider the travel and tourism industry. 

However, you might be pleasantly surprised when you find out that several corporate professionals are equally involved in your clientele. Gathering this information through topic targeting allows you to learn that you can explore different forms of advertising for your business — you expand your field of vision beyond simplicity. 

Podcasts, videos, and articles of different topics and targeting different demographics can ultimately be a part of your digital marketing campaign. 

Make Topic Targeting a Part of Your Digital Marketing Campaign

Topic targeting can help your business in ways that you wouldn’t otherwise consider. From reaching your niche and building impressions to remarketing to the ideal audience and ultimately proceeding on the scale of your buyer persona, topic targeting is a process that can be beneficial to your business in the long run.

By Kiara McColl

How to Use Instagram Reels, from Creating Clips to Posting on Explore

JUL. 14, 2020

With the U.S. possibly banning TikTok, fans of the social media app are left seeking an alternative that quenches their viral video needs. So of course, the recent rollout of Instagram Reels — an obvious TikTok copycat — couldn’t have come at a more opportune time. 

How do you use Reels? It’s not as simple as Instagram Stories, and it functions suspiciously similar to its TikTok competitor. If you’re not experienced with TikTok, you have much to learn. If you’re well acquainted with the Chinese-owned app, learning Reels will be easy. 

Before diving into the instructional part of this piece, it’s important to first understand Reels’s features. 

Instagram Reels Features

Audio: Reels contains an audio library from which you can select the track that plays in your video. You can choose from a slew of popular songs, such as Yummy by Justin Bieber and Watermelon Sugar by Harry Styles. You can also record an original track, which will be attributed to you and made available for public use: meaning, other Instagrammers can use your sound. 

Augmented Reality Effects: AR effects, made by Instagram and other creators, spice up your videos. You can apply one that places a dancing crowd around you or that makes your environment sparkle and shine. You can also use face filters, such as the ones provided by Instagram Stories.

Timer and Countdown: You can set your video to automatically record, hands-free, after a countdown. You can also set the duration of your video so it automatically ends after a certain number of seconds. 

Align: With this feature, you can align objects from your previous clip to make a seamless transition to your next clip. 

Speed: You can adjust the speed of your video, making it move slow or fast — whatever you wish. 

How to Access Reels from Instagram 

Step 1: Click on the camera icon from the upper-left corner of your screen. 

 

 

Step 2: From the revolving menu at the bottom, swipe right to “Reels.”

 

That’s it. You can now record videos using Reels. 

How to Create Instagram Reels

Step 1: Choose a sound by clicking “Audio” on the left menu.

 

 

If you have a public account, your reel may appear on the audio page, which users access by clicking on the track you’re using.

Step 2: Choose the clip you want to feature by dragging the selector tool from left to right. Click “Done” when finished. 

 

 

Step 3: Hold the record button to create your first clip. Release button to end recording.

 

 

After recording your first clip, you will notice a progress bar on top of your video. This progress bar will show you the number of clips you recorded (marked by a white line) and the amount you have left to record more clips. If you’re satisfied with your video, you can post it on Explore.

 

 

Step 4: Hold the record button again to film the second clip. 

Here, you can flip the camera from front-facing to back-facing or vice versa by clicking the camera button on the lower-right corner of your screen. 

 

 

You can also click the align tool to align your face or an object with the previous clip. 

 

 

If you want to include AR effects, you can do so by clicking “Effects” on the left menu. 

 

 

If you want to change your video speed, click the play icon from the left menu. 

 

 

Step 5: Click the forward arrow to review your video. 

 

 

Step 6: Review your video and click the forward arrow again to post. 

 

 

Step 6: Choose your cover image. 

 

 

Step 7: Click “Share” to post video to Explore.

If you don’t want your video to appear on your feed, click on the toggle button. 

 

 

Your reel will appear on top of the Explore feed.  

 

 

How to Record Instagram Reels Hands-Free

Step 1: Click “Timer” from the left menu. 

 

 

Step 2: To set your timer, move the selector from left to right. You can record for a maximum of 15 seconds. 

 

 

Step 3: Click “Set Timer.”

 

 

You have three seconds before the video starts. 

By Anne Felicitas

AdvertiseMint Releases The Complete Guide to Digital Advertising Policies Infographic

AUG. 13, 2020

Today AdvertiseMint released its new infographic, The Complete Guide to Digital Advertising Policies. 

The infographic contains a list of 120 businesses that are and aren’t allowed on certain digital advertising platforms, including Facebook, Reddit, and Hulu. Businesses and industries range from cannabis to bitcoin, medical supplies to OTC drugs, dating to religion. 

The infographic started as a spreadsheet used internally by the AdvertiseMint team to determine whether the agency can onboard certain businesses according to a specific digital platform’s ad policy. Because it has proven useful, the team at AdvertiseMint decided to turn the document into an infographic that the public can download and use. 

Now anyone can get the resource for free. Click here to download The Complete Guide to Digital Advertising Policies.

This isn’t the first infographic AdvertiseMint has released. In the past, the agency has created several resources, including The Complete Guide to LinkedIn Ad Targeting, The Complete Guide to Snapchat Ad Targeting, and the wildly successful The Complete Guide to Facebook Ad Targeting. 

8 Ways to Grow Your TikTok Followers without Spending a Dime

Solen Feyissa / Unsplash

TikTok is one of the fastest growing social media platforms, with more than 800 million active monthly users in July 2020, making it a great place to find an audience and create a following for your brand.

There are many ways to increase your audience on TikTok. For example, you can grow your account through organic traffic and engagement, a method that’s cheaper than paid ads and that results in obtaining a loyal audience.

Here are eight ways to increase your follower count on TikTok without spending a dime.

1. Know Your Target Your Audience

As with any social media platform, one of the first steps to successful channel growth on TikTok is clearly identifying your audience. Failing to target a defined audience is one of the most common TikTok marketing mistakes. Finding a niche or underserved audience to target your content means you will face less competition as you build a loyal following.

Because knowing your audience is important, it is vital to get feedback from your early subscribers about what they want from your channel and your content. This will help you keep your channel moving in a direction that appeals to your followers.

2. Optimize Your Schedule

A regular content schedule can benefit your TikTok channel in several ways. Ensuring your audience knows when to expect new content throughout the week helps increase repeat viewers. It also ensures that returning viewers visiting your channel will find new content — they are less likely to return again if they get the impression that your schedule is slow or irregular.

A regular content schedule also enables you to analyze and optimize your channel’s performance by making it easy to track and compare different posting times. This is vital because there are no clear rules for the best times to post on TikTok, and optimal posting times vary greatly from one audience to the next. Posting at least once a day is advisable for most channels, however. 

3. User-Generated Content

The ability to interact directly with followers via user-generated content (UGC) is one of the biggest attractions of the TikTok platform. More than half of its users upload their own videos. Besides engaging your existing followers and giving them a chance to take part in your campaigns, UGC is an effective way to attract new users. 

UGC events and competitions encourage your audience to share their videos with their own followers and friends, increasing awareness of your channel and introducing it to new users. It can also be a great way to provide social proof about your business by asking customers to submit video testimonials or showcases of how they use your product. This type of content can inspire your existing customers as well as attract new ones. 

4. Engage with Other Channels

User engagement plays a big part in your channel’s success on TikTok. This also goes for your interactions with your followers and other relevant brands. Engaging with other businesses and influencers on the comments section or through response posts not only introduces you to the audiences of other relevant channels, but it also establishes that you have interesting and original takes on their content. 

A great response or comment that gets the attention of other channels will help draw more of their audience to you and can even open up collaboration opportunities. TikTok greatly facilitates this kind of interaction with its Duet feature, enabling you to create a response that includes the original post. Make sure you have this feature enabled on your own channel so they can reply.

5. Trends and Challenges

Keep track of the viral trends and challenges making their way around the TikTok platform. These are a highly popular form of UGC contest that can attract huge audiences. Thirty-five percent of the platform’s users have taken part in one of these challenges, and 16% of all content on the platform is related to them. 

At the most basic level, trends and challenges provide an easy way for your channel to jump into the latest discussions and earn some visibility; however, putting some effort and creativity into your challenges can help win over new followers. Most challenges are designed to encourage users to put their own original spin on the idea, which can be a great opportunity to show off your brand’s personality.

6. Hashtag Research

It is vital to research the hashtags your target audience uses and follows to ensure potential new subscribers organically find your content in their feeds. Hashtag popularity can change dramatically over time as new hashtags become more popular or as conversations move to different topics. Furthermore, using the same tags on every post can be seen as spam.

As a result, research needs to be done regularly to stay on top of hashtag trends. It is usually much easier to gain traction using less popular terms that are still regularly used, such as hashtags for local businesses or attractions. These often also have the benefit of being more specific to your target audience.

7. Share TikTok Content on Other Networks

A lot of the content posted to TikTok can be adapted for other social media platforms, compiled into longer videos for YouTube, or even embedded in your site or blog. Sharing videos while letting your audience know they can access more of your content earlier on TikTok raises awareness of your channel and brings your existing followers from other platforms.

8. Text Your Followers

SMS marketing can help bring your audience from other channels over to TikTok by sharing your latest or most successful content with your text subscribers. Your text subscribers from other social media channels may not be aware of the content you post on TikTok unless you let them know.

Furthermore, promoting your SMS number on TikTok enables your subscribers to learn more about your brand without your account turning into a sales channel. This method can boost your text subscribers and account by sharing exclusive text codes with your audience, giving users another reason to follow you for early access to these codes.

Conclusion

Engaging with your audience and other relevant channels is key to success on TikTok. Make full use of TikTok’s features, interact with other users, and keep track of the latest trends to ensure your content stays fresh and relevant. Analyze how your audience responds to your content and build your video format and schedule around their preference.

The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Retargeting for Your Ecommerce Store

AUG. 10, 2020

Rawpixel

Have you ever browsed an online store, perhaps even putting items in your shopping cart, but not made a purchase? Did you notice that shortly afterward, you were seeing advertisements for that store on your social media feeds? 

If so, you’ve been on the receiving end of retargeted advertising. In this guide, we’ll look at Facebook retargeting and how to use it to increase sales for your ecommerce store. Let’s get started.

What Is Retargeting?

Retargeted advertising, or simply retargeting, is a form of advertising in which messages are delivered to audience segments based on previous actions, for example visiting your store. The reasoning: If a person has previously visited your store, browsed your products, or perhaps put items in their carts, they’re much warmer leads than someone who has never heard of your brand before. 

Why Should You Do Retargeted Advertising? 

Retargeting is a popular strategy because it works. Not convinced? Consider these statistics: 

According to Criteo, website visitors who are retargeted are 43% more likely to convert.
The average click-through rate (CTR) for a retargeted ad is around 0.7%, according to Wishpond. For a display ad, it’s 0.07%.  
Wordstream found that the more times a prospective customer sees the ad, the more likely they are to convert.

Jack Paxton, co-founder of VYPER, says, “After spending millions of dollars on Facebook ads in 2020, so far we have a four times better return on ad spend (ROAS) on retargeting ads compared to prospecting. If you are just getting started, create your remarketing campaigns before anything else.”

With numbers like that, no one can deny the effectiveness of retargeted advertising. This article shows you why you should be retargeting on Facebook and how to get started. 

How Does Facebook Retargeting Work?

Here’s how Facebook retargeting works: You insert a little bit of code called a Facebook Pixel into the header of your website. The Pixel tracks the actions visitors take on your website. Importantly, it associates those actions with specific individuals so you know who to retarget later. 

A customer interacts with your company online. Perhaps he or she visits your ecommerce store, browses around, and maybe even puts items in her shopping cart — but she does not make a purchase. She leaves and visits other sites, including Facebook. 

You then use your Pixel to define an audience for your Facebook ad. Unlike a standard Facebook ad, where you might segment your audience by demographic details or interests, with a retargeted ad you can segment according to who interacted with a particular page on your website. 

 

Now that you know how Facebook retargeting works, let’s go through the process of setting it up step by step. 

How to Get Started

Facebook retargeting is simpler than it seems, and you don’t need to be a web expert or know how to code. Follow these steps to get your first campaign up and running. 

Get a Facebook Pixel

Before you do anything else, you need to get your Facebook Custom Audiences Pixel — that little piece of code that does all the tracking for you. Here’s how you do it: 

Set up a Facebook Business account, if you don’t have one already. Set yourself as the administrator. You can also set other team members as administrators, if you wish. 
Go into Business Manager and click “Business Settings.”
Click on your business and then “Data sources.”
Select “Pixels” then click the plus button to add a Pixel.
Give your Pixel a name. At this stage, you can also enter your website URL, and Facebook will check whether your website was set up with one of its retargeting partners (this makes integrating the pixel easier) then click “Continue.”
Choose “Add code using a partner integration” if you use an ecommerce tool or CMS with a Facebook integration. If not, choose “Manually add pixel code to the website.” Choose “Email instructions to a developer” if your Web Developer is doing the next step for you.
From there, follow the instructions to add your pixel using your integration, or insert it into the backend of your website if you have a basic understanding of coding. If not, ask your Web Developer to do it for you or use a plugin like PixelYourSite. 

Once you’ve got that bit sorted out, you’re ready to get started with your retargeting campaign. 

Define Your Audience

A Custom Audience is a group of people you’ll market to based on specific parameters. In the case of retargeted advertising, these parameters will be actions taken on your website. 

Some of the Custom Audience types you might want to consider for the purposes of retargeting include: 

Existing customers. The marketing cliché that it’s easier and cheaper to keep a customer than to attract a new one is true. By targeting those who have purchased from you before, you will enjoy a much higher conversion rate than from targeting new prospects. 
Cart abandoners. Cart abandonment refers to putting things in your virtual shopping cart but not completing the purchase. According to Sleeknote, abandoned cart retargeting can send 26% of those people back to your site. 
Previous site visitors. These people didn’t buy or put things in their shopping carts, but they were still interested enough to spend time browsing your store. 

The audience you choose will depend on the goals of your campaign. You can also try retargeting to a variety of Custom Audiences and see which segments see the best results. 

To create a Custom Audience, go to “Audiences” in your Ads Manager on Facebook, click “Create audience,” and select “Custom Audience.” 

Choose “Website” under the “Use your sources” header: 

Finally, set your parameters in the rule section and give your Custom Audience a descriptive name. Once you’ve created your Custom Audience, you can select it during the ad-creation process. 

How to Create the Perfect Retargeting Ad

Now that you’re ready to create your ad, let’s look at how to make it really stand out. Statistics suggest that the average adult sees hundreds, if not thousands, of advertisements per day. They are everywhere — on our billboards, television screens, smartphones and, of course, our social media feeds. 

So if your retargeted ad is going to work, you need to find a way to cut through all that noise and make your prospective customers sit up and take notice. Here are a few of the strategies that I, and other experts, recommend.

Use Dynamic Product Ads

Dynamic Product Ads are fantastic for ecommerce store owners. You can choose to target customers based on three specific behaviors: viewing a product, adding it to cart, or making a purchase. Dynamic Product Ads display product pages that your customers have indicated an interest in based on these behaviors.

Here’s an example of a Dynamic Product Ad for retargeting: 

Source: KlientBoost

Setting up a Dynamic Product Ad requires going through a few steps to get it set up, but once it’s live, you can leave it alone to do its thing. Here’s how you do it. 

First, upload your product catalog to Facebook through your Business Manager using the “Prct Catalogs” button listed under “Assets.”

Once you’ve uploaded your catalog, you’ll need to create a product feed. This is a spreadsheet listing all your product details and can be divided into different categories if you wish (e.g., a clothing retailer might create separate product feeds for men’s, women’s, and children’s apparel.) You’ll need to follow the formatting guidelines so your product feed works correctly. Many ecommerce platforms come with a built-in product feed functionality to make this part easier for you. Finally, connect your Pixel to your catalog using the Catalog Manager.

You can now create a Dynamic Ad template using Ads Manager, choosing whether you want to display a single product or multiple products at once. At this stage, you’ll also select your Custom Audience, which we walked through a moment ago, and decide which customer behaviors you want to target. You only need one template to target customers on desktop, mobile, and tablet, and once you’ve set your parameters, your ad runs automatically. 

Offer a Lead Magnet

A lead magnet is something you offer to your audience for free to entice them back to your website. What you offer will depend on the nature of your store and what you sell, but possible offers include discount codes, e-books or guides, product-matching quizzes, and free shipping. Make the offer prominent in your ad, and make sure you emphasize the value it offers to the customer. 

Here’s an example from photography company Snapfish:

Source: ShortStack

Notice how the free offer is placed front and center in the ad. It might seem counter intuitive to generate sales by giving things away for free, but lead magnets are actually one of the most consistently successful sales strategies. 

Just make sure you choose something that is relevant to your business and appealing to your target audience. 

Announce New Launches

Chances are, if a prospective customer was interested enough to visit your store, they might like to know about new product launches. Make sure previous customers and website visitors are the first to know about new releases by using retargeted ads to draw them back to your site. 

Here’s an example from online fashion store, Modcloth: 

Source: Connectio

This type of ad serves to remind customers that they haven’t visited your site in a while and nudges them to take a look at your new releases. Notice the informal tone that speaks directly to the customer as though they were a friend. Combined with the “free shipping” lead magnet, this makes for a high-converting ad. 

Cross-Sell and Upsell

Cross-selling and upselling is perfect for retargeting customers who have already bought from your store. The trick is to retarget buyers with products that make sense and work together with their original purchase. 

Did they buy a summer dress? You could retarget them with the perfect pair of shoes to go with it. Did they buy a new computer? Why not upsell your newest keyboard-and-mouse combo? 

Here’s an example. This Amazon ad for a coffee pot could be targeted toward people who recently purchased coffee beans:

Source: Facebook

The personalized language of “our recommendation for you” builds a connection between the customer and the brand and shows that the customer understands the buyer’s needs and purchasing habits. 

Promotions and Discounts 

Everyone loves saving money. Retargeting customers who visit your site but didn’t buy and offering them a special deal or discount is a highly effective strategy. It works particularly well if you focus on those who got as far as putting items in their carts and then abandoned them. 

Source: ClickZ

In this example, clothing retailer PACT Apparel targets customers who abandoned their carts and offers a 20% discount. You can take it one step further and introduce a limited-time offer, which creates a sense of fear of missing out (FOMO) and drives the customer to click the “Buy now” button sooner. 

Going Live

Now that you’ve decided on the format of your ad, written the perfect copy, and set your audience parameters, you’re almost ready to go!  

Set Your Budget

The beauty of Facebook advertising is you can control exactly how much you spend. Choose your maximum daily budget and how long you want your campaign to run. 

You don’t need a huge budget to make Facebook retargeting work for you. You can start from as low as three to five dollars per day and see results, as long as your audience is well-defined and your ad correctly configured. 

When you’re starting out, I recommend dedicating a small budget to several campaigns, which will allow you to test out different parameters and formats to see what works best. 

Monitor, Track, Adjust

Marketers often refer to social media advertising as “set and forget” because it runs itself once you have set it up. However, you will only succeed if you clearly define your goals and keep track of how you’re doing. Therefore, it’s essential to monitor your campaign at every stage. 

Use Facebook’s Ad Manager reports to track metrics such as engagements, click-through rate, and conversions. And, of course, analyze your sales figures against your ad dates. Did you see an uptick in revenue? If so, great! If not, adjust accordingly. 

If you’re running multiple campaigns, compare and contrast to assess which strategies work and which do not. 

Finally, don’t be afraid to change things that aren’t working. You can tweak your budget, amend your formatting, change your audience parameters, and even stop an ad entirely if you aren’t seeing the results you wanted. Social media advertising is a skill, so don’t worry if it takes time to learn all the tricks and get it right.

Scaling Your Retargeting Strategy

When you’ve found the retargeting strategies that work for your store, you need to start scaling your efforts if you want to see maximum results. Here are some ways to scale your Facebook retargeting:

Increase your budget. If your ads are working, a higher budget means more eyes will see them. 
Fine-tune your messaging to be as specific as possible. Ads that feel highly personalized will convert better than generic ads every time.
Segment your audience. By segmenting your audience further using highly specific interests and behaviors, you can better deliver those perfectly targeted ads. 
Add a special offer or bonus. Free shipping or a freebie will entice more sales.
Add more products or product categories to your campaign.

There’s an in-built limit to how far you can scale a retargeting campaign alone as it is based on the volume of traffic your site or store receives. Therefore, along with scaling your efforts using the strategies suggested above, you should also focus on maximizing conversions and increasing your site traffic. 

Therefore, if you see fewer conversions than you’d like, or they drop off after an initial spike, it’s time to tweak your ad. Are your product photos clear and professional? Is your copy quite right? Do you have a compelling offer or lead magnet to entice people to click that button? 

Consistently working to drive more traffic to your site is something online retailers and ecommerce store owners should be doing anyway. Focus on Search Engine Optimization (SEO), implement or increase pay-per-click marketing efforts, and work on scaling both your organic and paid social media traffic. As your site traffic increases, your retargeting can naturally scale alongside it. 

Conclusion

The data proves that retargeting works. It’s one of the best ways to capture sales from those people who were interested enough to visit your site but not quite ready to buy.

It takes practice and perseverance to get it right. But given the enormous numbers of people who use Facebook, it is a strategy that ecommerce store owners need to get to grips with if they want to maximize sales. 

I hope these tips have been helpful and will guide you through the process of setting up your first retargeted ad on Facebook. 

Here’s to more sales than ever! 

By Jimmy Rodriguez

6 Essential Skills Every Social Media Manager Should Have

AUG. 6, 2020

Nghia Nguyen/Unsplash

Social media has become an integral part of every digital marketing strategy. With more than 3.8 billion people using social media, businesses can no longer ignore social media marketing.  

Because of social media growth, the demand for social media managers is increasing. Business owners are looking for professionals who can not only handle their social accounts but also help them improve their social media marketing game.

Let’s take a look at the top six skills that can help you land your dream job as a social media manager. 

1. Writing and Speaking Proficiency

Since social networks are all about communicating with people, expressing views, and sharing updates, you must be proficient in writing and speaking. 

As a social media manager, you have to ensure all the posts you publish reflect your company’s personality and meet your audience’s intent. You also need to fit captivating stories in your posts to increase engagement. To enhance your writing skills, read guides related to copywriting and social media content creation. 

With the rise in videos, you also need to be confident, especially when going live on social media. Facebook and Instagram Live are increasing in popularity, primarily because they allow customers to engage with brands in real time. Having good public speaking skills will help you present your ideas, answer customer queries, and chat with your followers. 

Here are some tips to enhance your public speaking skills:

For recorded videos, memorize a script. 
For live videos, rather than writing a script, plan the topics you’re going to cover.
Focus on your skills and hone them. For example, if you have a great sense of humor, use it to your advantage to make your live videos hilarious and engaging. 
At the start of your video, give your viewers a sneak peek into what they can expect. This will keep them hooked, boosting your confidence. 
If your mind suddenly goes blank during the video, pause for a few seconds, take a deep breath or drink water, then continue. 
Practice before going live on social media. This way, you will be better at speaking in front of the camera and your audience. 

2. In-Depth Understanding of Consumer Behavior

Consumer behavior refers to the study of your ideal customers to understand how they select and use a product or service. You need to determine your target audience’s behavior to capitalize and use it to your advantage. 

Here are some questions that can help you better understand consumers: 

Which alternative products or services do they think about?
How do they choose products? What factors affect their buying decision?
Does the environment (culture, media, etc.) influence them?
Do marketing campaigns influence them? 

As for the factors that influence consumer behavior, they include:

Personal factors: A person’s interest has a direct influence on his or her behavior. Demographics such as age, culture, gender, and profession also have an impact. 
Psychological factors: Everybody responds to a marketing campaign based on his or her perception of the brand or the item advertised. 
Social factors: Social class, income, education level, family, friends’ suggestions, and peer groups also influence consumer behavior.

While understanding consumer behavior might sound easy, it’s not, especially when you have thousands of customers talking about your product or company on social media. 

It’s recommended that you complete a degree that teaches consumer behavior, so you’re better positioned to gather actionable insights and fuel your social media marketing campaign. Another benefit of earning a degree is the opportunity to learn interactive marketing and business policies and strengthen your critical thinking and creative analysis abilities.

3. Ability to Quickly Adapt to Trends

Being able to adapt is yet another important skill for a social media manager to hone. Social media is probably one of the first places where changing trends are observed. 

To adapt to trends, you first need to discover them. Here’s how you can find trends in two easy steps:

Use social media to learn more about your customers. Determine the “what” in social media posts. What posts are people attracted to? What kind of posts are people sharing? Those are your customer’s interests. 
Understand the “why” behind it. Why are customers sharing certain posts? This will help you understand the underlying causes of those trends. 

There’s not one defined way to adapt to trends. Look at what your competitors are doing, how they are reacting to trends, and what responses they are receiving. Experiment with various strategies to find what works best for your business then create a customized plan to outdo them. Keep an eye on your data and customer feedback to determine if your tactics are working or if they need improvement. 

4. Ability to Build Digital Relationships

Building a digital relationship with your target audience is one of the most vital skills that every social media manager must possess.

Consumers are getting increasingly comfortable with interacting with brands on social media. In fact, 82% of millennials use social media to engage with brands and so do 65% of customers from other generations. Meanwhile 78% of people say their buying decisions are influenced by companies’ social media posts. 

Some key points to remember when building digital relationships:

Listen Before You Speak

Offer value to your customers with each message or content you post. To do this, you need to first listen to what they are expecting from you then offer them customized solutions to solve their problems. Also, create tailored content for your target audience. The more your content is audience-centered, the more valuable your customers will feel. 

Provide an Instant Response

According to a report, 32% of consumers who reach out to brands on social media expect a response within 30 minutes. 

While it might not be possible for you, alone, to respond to each query within 30 minutes, make sure your team knows the right way to reply to customers’ issues. If their inquiries are not handled professionally, you might lose them.  

Personalize Your Conversation

Don’t always throw automated or scripted messages at your customers. Here are some ways to personalize your conversation in social media: 

Use the customer’s first name while addressing him or her.
Sign off with your name.
Always maintain a friendly tone to show you’re there to help them. 

5. Empathetic Approach to Social Media Marketing

Empathy is all about showing customers that you understand and care about them. As the face of your company on social media, you need to have an empathetic approach to marketing. Some ways to help you build the empathetic approach include: 

Creating a Content Plan

When creating content for social media, ensure that they are customer-centered. One of the best ways to create a content plan is by listing all the problems your ideal customers have on one side of your paper and then list all your brand’s expertise on the other. 

Identify areas where your customers’ problems and your expertise intersect. Brainstorm content ideas around those topics. To ensure your posts are not self-oriented or promotional, make sure to highlight what’s in it for the customers. 

Showing Your Human Side

Sixty-five percent of consumers say they are more loyal to brands they felt a human connection with. Although you can’t meet your customers face-to-face, you can do your best to show your human side.

Here’s how you can do it:

Share stories and backstage pictures, showing your humorous side. 
Consider posting something that appeals to both logic and emotion. 
Engage in discussions revolving around your industry, even where you’re not mentioned. 

Catering Posts to Target Audience

What works for one social media platform might not work for another. Each network has its own set of audience. For example, Instagram attracts millennials while Facebook mostly attracts the older generation. Therefore, it is essential to ensure your posts and messaging appeal to your audience on the platform you publish. This way, more customers will be able to connect with your brand on a personal level. 

6. Ability to Use Analytics to Drive Better Results

Data analysis is one of the must-have skills for social media managers. Analytics has two different meanings, depending on where it is used. For social media, analytics refers to likes, comments, shares, and mentions. For business metrics, it means traffic, leads, conversions, and revenue. 

As a social media manager, you must understand both types of analytics and tie them together to analyze the company’s social media performance against business goals. 

You should also be capable of using data to create new campaigns to accomplish your social media goals. For example, you should determine which ads or posts are performing better than others by looking at the data then capitalizing on them to drive more revenue. 

Understanding Both Qualitative and Quantitative Data

Qualitative data is non-statistical. It is categorized based on attributes, characteristics, or other identifiers. It includes understanding the thoughts and feelings of consumers behind their social media posts or messages. 

Using qualitative data, you can create tailored campaigns to micro-target unique audiences and increase engagement. 

Quantitative data, on the other hand, is about numeric variables. For example, the number of likes, comments, and shares you receive on social media. Quantitative data helps ensure whether you are going in the right direction with qualitative analysis or not. 

Both combined give a 360-degree view of your social performance. 

Using Data Analysis Tools

Being a social media manager, you must know how to use data analysis tools. You might be wondering, there are tons of different tools, and it is not possible to learn each one. But, most of them provide similar types of data. All you need to know is which data to look for and how to use it. 

Reporting on Social Performance

As a part of your job, you will have to report on social performance every month or quarter. Reporting does not mean focusing solely on numbers. It also includes identifying trends and creating recommendations and a plan of action. 

Analytics gives you a solid foundation to support your decisions and show why you created the plan. 

Conclusion 

If you are not proficient in each skill mentioned above, strive to improve in every area. If you already excel in all the six abilities, congrats, but you still have work to do. Remember, a career in social media is a path of continuous learning and honing your skills. 

By Joydeep Bhattacharya

TikTok Copycat Instagram Reels Now Available to Select Countries

JUL. 5, 2020

Image courtesy of Instagram.com

Today Instagram announced an addition to its 20-year-old app: Reels. 

The new feature, available only to select countries, allows users to create a string of 15-minute videos, set to a track from Instagram’s music library. Users can also use their original sound, record hands-free, apply AR effects, and share their videos to Explore. 

Sounds familiar?

Reels has been labeled a TikTok competitor, and for good reason. Looking at the eerie similarities, it’s likely many of Reels’ features were inspired by the Chinese-owned app. 

Take the audio feature, for example. With this feature, users can not only select music to go along with their videos, but they can also record an original sound, which remains on Instagram’s library for public use. 

Reel’s timer and countdown features are also reminiscent of TikTok. With these features, users can set a countdown to record their videos hands-free and set a timer to automatically stop the recording after a specified number of seconds. 

Instagram Reels is no doubt a TikTok clone, and for those skeptical — remember, this isn’t the first time the social media company has attempted to eliminate a competitor through imitation. The now beloved Instagram Stories is (quite obviously) an (albeit better) knockoff of Snapchat.

The release of Reels comes at an opportune time: Currently, there are talks of banning TikTok in the U.S., and should those plans come through, Instagram Reels could be a fitting replacement. 

By Anne Felicitas

7 Surefire Ways to Sell without Being Too Salesy

AUG. 3, 2020

Artem Beliaikin / Pexels

Today we live in an amazing world where people can get whatever they want, and they often have several options for where they can get it. No wonder businesses spend an incredible amount of resources on marketing. However, overdoing it may result in consumers feeling manipulated and walking away. How do you not sound salesy while convincing your prospects to use your product or services?

1. Relate to Customers’ Pain

Consumers are ready to pay for a remedy to their pain points. Before you sell anything, you have to identify your customers’ needs and the ways your product or service is going to help them. Use the data from your support and sales teams, study market survey reports, and establish communication channels with your audience. Get in touch with those who are already using your products and ask what you could do better. 

Next, you can use this information to give actionable tips on how to use your product. Highlight your product’s unique features and quality. Give only the necessary information so that your customer isn’t bored. Yet, make sure to put together a helpful knowledge base where you list the advanced specifications for the inquiring minds.

2. Use Content to Educate Consumers

A blog is a powerful way to show that you are an expert in your industry, building trust around your company without sounding too salesy. Here, you can delve into in-depth explanations, share specific benefits of your product, talk about trends, post interviews with professionals, or give how-to tips. With social media marketing involved, a blog starts a conversation and attracts potential prospects.

Keep in mind that because readers are busy and fed up with lots of low-quality content, they tend to skim. A good way to make your texts easier to digest is by using visuals. The 2019 study from Venngage shows that original graphics, like illustrations and infographics, worked best for most content marketers, so experiment and see what your audience prefers.

3. Develop a Keep-in-Touch Strategy

People talk. They discuss numerous things and your company, too. If they talk about your company, they might as well start a dialogue with it. Monitor what’s being said about your brand and product and engage in the conversation. Here’s what you can do to set a relationship with your audience:

Repost their relevant content and thank them.
Offer something sweet (a discount, freebie, sample) every now and then.
Help them with a valuable tip on something they have trouble with.
Respond to complaints.

A good way is to ask open-ended questions that lead to a discussion. After all, if your prospects do the talking, you have no chance of seeming salesy or pushy. Look how Glocier finds what’s on its audience’s mind and handles a follower’s inquiry on Instagram:

4. Prioritize Your Customers’ Security

There’s just one thing that all customers want from all businesses: They want a guarantee that they will benefit from the purchase. If there is the slightest sign that they may regret having bought from you, they won’t do it, leaving you with no sales. That means you have to prove to your audience that they will enjoy using your product. Here are the basic guarantees every reliable provider has on his or her website:

Money-back policy
Return policy
Safe payment systems
Security badges

In addition, the statistics by GetVoIP shows that more than half of customers believe that automated systems can harm their personal data safety. So, make sure you have balanced out the issues of comfort for your customer service agents and your clients’ security needs.

5. Revise Your Email List

Building an email list takes time and effort. Make sure you only have those members in your list that gave their permission to receive your marketing emails. If you haven’t sent anything for a while, chances are your list has gone stale. So you’ll want to try to reactivate sleeping contacts and get those inactive clients back before you market anything to them.

Next, take time to get to know your audience and create catchy initial emails to send to prospects that don’t sound salesy. Especially in those first emails, make sure that subject lines hint to your readers about what’s inside rather than push them to open the email. 

Using a conversational approach to copywriting is a good way to make your copy sound less salesy and remove distrust.

6. Let Them Try Your Product for Free

This tip is not for every business. However, letting consumers get a sneak peek into what your product or service can do for them is a surefire way to not sound salesy while increasing awareness. If your product or service is eligible for free sampling, you may

Send a sample to a limited number of people and ask them for a review that will later go on your website.
Offer your samples to an influencer to spread awareness and bring prospects to your page.
Use events to distribute free samples to spur interest and make prospects search for you.

Keep in mind that customers tend to trust their own research rather than a salesperson’s. So, your task is to provide them with enough information by creating a strong social selling strategy.

7. Go Steady

Prepare your audience for purchase using a step-by-step launch strategy. By portioning out the information, you reduce the level of salesy, but do not let your customers forget about you. Here is the basic sequence to build awareness about your product or company:

Educate your target audience about issues, popular solutions, and effective methods. Mention your product and how helpful it is in each described issue.
Announce the most widespread pains and discreetly indicate how your product can alleviate them.
Tease your product with an appealing visual and strong message.
You are ready to launch.

While your product is already on the market, remember to continue educating your audience about it, explore your clients’ pain points, and adjust your sales pitches.

There you have it. In order to succeed, you need to tweak your perception of yourself from a provider to a consultant. Consumers don’t need things anymore, they need solutions. This approach will take time, but it will gain trust from your prospects, which proves to be much more effective in the long run.

By Lidia Bondarenko