One of the most common mistakes brands make in their social media strategies is focusing on the information they would like to push out, rather than the content their audience is interested in, says Liesl de Bruin, digital strategist at Meropa Communications.
Brands often try to "retrofit" creative design onto marketing content that has not been crafted with its audience in mind, says Mike Sharman, MD at Retroviral. Truly engaging audience members requires extensive research into who these audience members are, and what they like to engage with, he says.
"There are far too many examples of brands [simply] selling themselves" on social media, says De Bruin, when brands must in fact work to cultivate relationships with their audiences.
In addition, many brands simply create default content to be pushed across all different channels, says Sharman. Yet each media or social media channel - be it Facebook, Twitter, or a more traditional channel such as radio - is visited by its users for a different, unique kind of engagement, and hence different media channels should be approached with different content and strategies, Sharman explains.
"People come to social media to be entertained," says De Bruin, whether through content that is funny, touching, or thought-provoking. Brands can garner better engagement and initiate relationships with their audience by meeting these needs, she says.
"You need to have remarkable content in everything you do," adds Sharman. Even a tweet should be crafted to be as eye-catching as an advertisement one puts on a street pole, he offers, as social media content can so easily get lost in the deluge of information users constantly sift through.
Brands must "accept that social media is now a very real part of the communication mix," and invest in skilled social media staff and the tools they may need, says De Bruin.
Many companies do not understand the importance of social media, Sharman agrees.
Yet because social media platforms have developed and become popular so quickly, the workforce has not necessarily caught up with this need, Sharman continues. While there are many social media professionals with extensive experience in the field, and a growing number of "newbies" with freshly earned tertiary qualifications in social media, digital marketing does not yet have a "fully fledged middle management," he explains.
In appointing social media staff, Sharman advises either going through an agency or hiring a team of people with communications qualifications who are "obsessively" passionate about social media, and will learn about it and develop new skills with enthusiasm and speed.
De Bruin will be speaking about using social media for business at the second day of the Showbiz Entertainment Art Expo, in Johannesburg on Saturday, 5 September. The expo aims to shed light on "the business side of show business" and expand on how entertainers can use technology to build their audiences.
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