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Search Social Media Tips... Social networks have to make money — and they can’t do it

by continuing to offer their audience engagement platforms

to brands for free. So, with Facebook at the helm, they’re

evolving into ad platforms, slowly chipping away at the

number of fans a brand can reach without paying to sponsor

its content. On top of that, there are 7x as many users on

social media than there were just five years ago, and those

users — both brands and individuals — are also creating

and sharing record amounts of content. And as a result,

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news feeds are surging with more brands, people, and

content than anyone could realistically consume. The

combination has left brand reach hovering at an all-time low

on Facebook, with the average unsponsored post for brands

with more than 500,000 Likes reaching less than two percent

of its fans. And experts estimate the odds aren’t much better

on Twitter.

Long story short, relying primarily on social networks to

engage with your audience is becoming an increasingly

expensive strategy. This is why leading brands are also

turning their attention back to their owned properties,

experimenting with new ways to make their websites, mobile

apps, and other digital assets just as enticing to fans as a

social network. Rather than letting their fan relationships live

and die on third-party social networks, these brands are

instead using social networks to drive audiences to similar

experiences on their owned properties. This doesn’t mean

social media is going away. It just means that instead of

using social networks as a fan destination in and of

themselves, brands are beginning to use them as a paid

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channel to drive traffic to their own websites, mobile apps

and microsites. This way, they can build valuable

connections with their fans on their own turf, where they set

the rules.

Early adopters like Taco Bell and Southern Comfort are

already pioneering “owned social” strategies of their own,

but shifting your entire audience from the social networks

they know and love onto a branded website doesn’t just

happen overnight. Remember how long it took your brand

to accumulate all of the fans and followers it has today, and

all the money you invested in campaigns, strategists, and

technology? Building an audience on your owned properties

will also take time and investment. But if you do it right, you’ll

end up with a stable, long-term home for your community

— and that might be more than any social network can offer.

Here’s how to do it:

Really, really get to know youraudience.

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I’m not talking about the demographics your agency uses for

media buys (though those are important too). Assemble a

research team — made of human beings, not robots — to

look at how the various segments of your audience interact

online. What platforms do they use the most? How do they

use those platforms, and how do they interact with your

brand specifically? Do they have conversations on your wall?

If so, about what? Do they like your posts? Do they share

them? Do they leave reviews? Are they already creating

content about your brand? What kind? Cross reference the

behavioral trends you discover with successful campaigns

from the past to find out what works best. How is your

audience most likely to naturally interact with your brand?

Define a clear objective.

Plenty of marketers set metrics, but surprisingly few give

much thought to the actual business goal they’re looking to

achieve. If you want to be truly effective, think bigger than

driving traffic or likes or shares — ask yourself why you want

to drive that traffic or earn those shares. Are you trying to

increase sales? Gather email addresses? Heighten brand

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increase sales? Gather email addresses? Heighten brand

loyalty or awareness? Identifying and understanding the big

picture enables you to think more holistically about how you

can use specific components (the things that drive traffic,

likes, downloads, etc.) of the experience together in order to

effectively drive user behavior.

Start small.

You don’t have to redesign your entire website all at once,

and you probably shouldn’t. Instead, look carefully at the

places where community is already thriving on your owned

properties. How can you enhance that experience to offer

more value for the fans who are visiting? What additional

context would help those users better connect with each

other, with your brand, or with the product? There’s no

single answer that will work across all of your digital

properties. User reviews or live chats, for example, might

work perfectly in one area, while trending products or user

photo uploads are better for something else. The experience

can and should vary based on how your audience prefers to

interact and the behavior you’re trying to drive.

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Give your audience an incentive toparticipate.

Regardless of the interaction, its function should always be

to add value for your audience. And that doesn’t just apply

to the content that populates the page — it should also be

true of the user’s participation. So if your objective is to

obtain email addresses, for example, consider offering

exclusive content in exchange for registration. Similarly, if

you’re looking to boost sales (but still need user content to

populate the experience), maybe offer a coupon in exchange

for participation. Contests, rewards, and even notoriety can

also be great motivators. Whatever you’re asking your users

to do, just make sure that A) it’s easy and B) the user has

something to gain from it.

Promote it.

Promotion can make or break an initiative, so use every

channel at your disposal to tell your audience where you

want them to go. This is especially true if you’re driving users

somewhere that didn’t exist before — like a newly-launched

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app, a microsite, or a new section of your website — because

without promotion, they won’t even know it’s there! So use

your email list and your blog, pay for promoted posts on

your social networks, and add CTAs to relevant media

campaigns. Make your owned experience the end

destination for your audience — not a social network.

Social media isn’t going away anytime soon, but it’s poised to

serve a very different purpose than what marketers are used

to. And the sooner you start adjusting your strategy, the

better off you’ll be.

Jordan Kretchmer is Founder and CEO of Livefyre.

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