Page 98 - Social Media Marketing for Dummies

Dyson, the vacuum cleaner brand, uses several hashtags when it posts to
Instagram but chooses them carefully so that it doesn’t come across as
heavy-handed. Here’s an example of the hashtags used in a single post on
June 4 , 2019: #dyson #dysonhome #insidedyson #vacuum #instatech. Most
th
brands limit themselves by only using one or two hashtags.
» A venue for crowdsourcing.
Are you going to create your own web page for people to share and submit
their comments, or will you use the current platforms? Decide whether you
want to create a Facebook page or a community on your own website or
another third-party one such as Tumblr. There are pluses and minuses to
each choice. If it’s important to own the content, by all means create your
own. Just remember that getting people to participate is easier where they
normally hang out. A new venue could be an impediment.
» Content that can be shared.

The key to every great SMM campaign is the content you create to get attention.
If you are a small business and can’t afford to create something splashy, you can
still do a video and create PDF posters, contests, and graphics. Look at all the
content you have already created, and see what you can repurpose. If doing so
makes sense, have your customers create content, and pick a winner.

Craft the content path

When creating SMM campaigns, people often forget to map where their actual touch
points will be and how they will look. It’s not enough to say, “We’ll send a tweet with
a link.” You need to be specific about it. You need to document that you will send
three tweets a day at 9 a.m., 5 p.m., and 9 p.m., say, with certain text and a link.

As a handy way to document your campaign, you can map each of your channels
and the content that will go into it. One of the best ways to do this is to create a
mind map that shows you the big picture of your campaign and all the moving
parts on one sheet of paper. Mind maps start with a circle in the middle and radi-
ate ideas that relate to it. For example, you can put your campaign name in the
center circle and then radiate circles of the different platforms you are using.
From each platform circle, you can note the content that will be sent. From those
mind maps, you can then create specific content calendars that help you manage
the content production process.

Your preplanned content is only the first part of what you will be doing. You have
to also organically create messages that respond to the ongoing campaign to make
it real. When people post something about your campaign on Facebook or Twitter,
make sure to respond to it in a reasonable amount of time, which should typically
be no more than 12 hours later at the very most. The preplanned items are just the
starting point. Social marketing means reacting to real-time events.

82 PART 2 Practicing SMM on the Social Web