by Laura | Aug 3, 2016 | Uncategorized
It’s easy to upload your email contact list to your Facebook fan page, but then what do you do with this new audience you’ve created?
For starters, you may simply find the information interesting. I recently uploaded a list for a client and we discovered that most of our list could be found on Facebook but, of those, only about one-quarter were following our Facebook page. Surely, there must be low-hanging fruit there?
So, we ran a small campaign targeted at this list of people who were signed up for our emails but not Facebook fans. The campaign yielded interesting results. Only a small percentage of this audience ultimately liked our Facebook page, but our acquisition cost was low, relative to similar campaigns.
The experiment may me wonder if our list has some weak links and that we may want to consider doing a clean-up. After all, if an email subscriber cannot be encouraged to like our Facebook page, they are probably unlikely to engage with us in more meaningful ways.
by Laura | Jul 29, 2016 | Uncategorized
A new client recently asked me to review their communications strategy.
At the time, their big push was a food drive at a local event. They wanted to fill a food pantry as well as raise awareness in the community. They were using email marketing, online advertising, traditional local print ads, and local PR. These were great ways to get the word out to the right audience. But then their strategy went off the rails.
Their emails and ads all had different calls to action. Some said, “Donate.” Others said, “Give.” Still others: “Make a difference.” Most people need to hear the same message seven times before they remember it, and if that message is not consistent, it will not stick. Decide on an effective call to action and then stick with it. Repeat it over and over, in a variety of channels. Let the message come from different places, but the message itself should always be the same.
This consistency needs to carry through to your visuals as well. If your email is linking to a web page, be sure that the email and the web page have a consistent look. The person needs immediate reassurance that they’ve arrived in the right place. Colors, visuals, and mood should all support your messaging and your call to action.
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by Laura | Jul 27, 2016 | Uncategorized
It’s tempting to target ads based on income. After all, if you are selling high-end items, you may want to pursue those with the means directly. I have never trusted this data and believe I have now confirmed my cynicism here.
I always suspected that users would not volunteer this info and, in fact, they don’t. According to Facebook: “Income is either consumer self-reported through a survey or estimated based on a variety of demographic data such as age, occupation, home ownership, and a median income for the local area., provided by Acxiom.” Is the data they cull accurate? It’s impossible to know.
However, a client of mine recently ran some ads which targeted high income individuals specifically. I have never seen ads perform so poorly.
So I don’t know if the income data Facebook possesses is accurate. I do, however, have preliminary proof that this type of targeting does not work well. I would much rather use a lookalike audience to reach new potential customers.
by Laura | Dec 20, 2015 | Uncategorized
Facebook video ads are a wonderful, inexpensive, and effective way to get the word out about your product, service, or idea. One of the best things about them is you can add a call to action at the end. With just a click, viewers will be brought directly to any web page you specify.
But there are two important things to be aware of: 1. you must set these up in Power Editor (for which you must use Google Chrome). Otherwise, your carefully crafted calls to action will disappear; and 2. if you set the ad up in Power Editor, it can only be 60 seconds long.
by Laura | Oct 9, 2015 | Uncategorized
1. Upload videos directly to Facebook and buy the video views objective. This has turned out to be a very cheap way to get a commercial out to a targeted audience.
2. Attach a call to action to the video. Facebook allows you to do this easily when you upload the video. When someone has finished watching, he or she will be led to click on the embedded link you’ve set up.
3. Include a call to action link within the post copy itself. That way, even if someone doesn’t watch the whole video, they will be directed to what you would like them to do.
by Laura | Jul 22, 2015 | Uncategorized
Twitter recently told me I was following too many people. I was annoyed at first but then realized they were right. Even with lists, following more than 2,000 people gets unmanageable. But how was I now going to pare down that number?
Enter Crowdfire (formerly Just Unfollow) and ManageFlitter. These apps make it easy to see who never even Tweets (why bother?), who has unfollowed you, and who is really still just an egg. I easily eliminated 100 people yesterday and I plan to go through this quick process every day until I’m following only relevant, updated content on Twitter.
I’ll also be checking out Tweebro and I’ll see how that compares.
