Dear 2012…
As we approach mid January, our New Year’s revelries have already blurred into our drunken back-catalogue and our resolutions are receiving their ultimate test in willpower.
That said, before this brief moment of newness and sense of beginning fades altogether, we wanted to take a moment to consider what the year 2012 has in store.
2012 is undoubtedly year of high hopes, for the Olympics and for the economy.
And in our small part of things, let 2012 be the year that:
- Social media becomes an integrated part of brand communications
Gone are the days when brands can choose to disregard social media or to view it as separate to their core marketing strategy.
Having the right logo design and the right look for your website has become a hygiene matter.
No matter how big or small you are, your consumer is talking about you. It’s time to get a voice because, if you don’t talk back, they’ll make friends with your competitor instead.
- Brands are proud to be British
Whether tapping into the spotlight the Olympics will throw onto the UK, continuing with heritage branding inspired by 2011’s Royal Wedding fever or evoking a sense of camaraderie for change as seen within recent protests and London riot clean up missions, 2012 is the year that will see brands celebrate their British heritage.
- We get face to face with consumers again
Social media has many benefits and one major benefit for brands during the recession was that it represented a cost-effective way to get dialogue with consumers in the midst of marketing budgets being slashed.
Events, field marketing and exhibitions were often the first lines to be deleted from budgets as results from these forms of marketing can be less quantifiable in boardroom terms.
The truth however is that one is no substitute for another. Yes all brands should be part of an online dialogue with their consumers via social media. But, face to face marketing is the most effective way for consumers to fully experience what your brand is all about and can be a way of connecting with another core of hard-to-reach consumers.
So, as late January bids welcome to the return of our New Year banished vices, we look forward to the year ahead and the challenges that lie in store.
Whether competing on the athletics track, on the stock market or on the Google rankings, 2012 is a year of high hopes for us all.
Liquid Graphic is here, ready to talk to you about why social media is relevant to your business, how you can refresh your brand image cost-effectively and how you can appear higher within the search engine rankings. Talk to us.
Five less-talked-about benefits of social media
Most marketers are attuned to the obvious benefits of using social media for online marketing.
These have to do with the ability of a social media campaign to successfully build brand awareness, generate leads, build loyalty and create interaction with a consumer. Even end-users have a pretty good clue about these nowadays.
While these things are no doubt important, they tend to overshadow some of the less-talked-about benefits of using social media for marketing.
So, today, we celebrate the underdog, and we present you with our top five more subtle benefits of social media:
The lingo
Targeting your consumer via social media means putting a more human voice to your product pitch. You’re still selling, but you’re engaging your consumer as their peer. It’s personal; it’s effective.
New horizons
Many companies have used social media as a platform to build new business partnerships. These partnerships can take many guises as online marketing opens more avenues and more room for experimentation than offline channels.
FD pleasing
Recession-bruised marketing budgets have fallen head-over-heels in love with the comparatively low costs associated with social media campaigns. Give the Financial Director some good news for a change.
Speedy
Social media offers a level of immediacy that other marketing channels will never ascend to. While ‘reactive’ is often considered a dirty word in marketing, in truth it’s sometimes a necessary word when it comes to PR or in the face of aggressive competition.
Wakey wakey
Let’s be real about this. At a time when banner adverts and pop ups dominate our computer screens to the point that we no longer notice them, a well-designed social media campaign is just more darned interesting.
Call us to talk about what’s involved in setting up a social media strategy and outline costs for us to run Facebook and Twitter campaigns for you.
Five reasons to get besotted with blogs
Blogs and marketers are good friends. At Liquid Graphic, we’re often asked to explain why blogs are such an important online marketing tool. Here’s why:
1. SEO
In order of importance, search engine optimisation (SEO) is the reason blogs are so valuable. Search engines look for informed, relevant and varying content and – where they find it – they reward it by moving it up the rankings. Blogs are the best and most cost-effective way to achieve the search engines’ criteria.
2. An authoritative voice
Blogs give you the opportunity to communicate the full features and benefits of your product, brand or service. You have the stage to write from the point of view as the expert, to commentate on your market and to provide context to market changes.
3. Re-release that press release
Blogs crave fresh content but this content doesn’t have to be unique to your brand, it can go straight ‘through the line’. Get more ROI (return on investment) from press releases, above the line advertising and below the line promotions by posting blogs about them.
4. Direct dialogue…
…with your clients or end-consumers. Whether you’re B2B or B2C, blogs are a simple and effective way to create a meaningful dialogue with your target audience.
5. Value for money
For those akin to crude boardroom banter, blogs provide “more bang for your buck”. Blogs yield impressive results within SEO and can help you build a relationship with your customer, all at a comparatively low cost within your marketing budget.
Blogs, keep them interesting, keep them regular, keep them informed…and laugh your way up the search engine rankings.
To talk to us about what’s involved in setting up and running a blog site as part of your online marketing strategy or SEO strategy, contact Liquid Graphic today.
Read all about it…Social Media wars and design heroes in the news
In a week where industry news has made mainstream headlines, we thought we’d take the time to reflect on a few of the stories that have made our ears prick up at Liquid Graphic this week:
The fight goes on, but now it’s gone rather more public as Facebook have hit headlines this week for hiring well-respected PR agency Burson-Marsteller to execute a smear campaign against Google’s new feature Social Circles.
Facebook have naturally been swift to defend their position, justifying the action as a need to highlight their disapproval of the movement of data to their users.
We say: 1/ bravo to Facebook on the superb spin job and 2/ we’ve got love for both Facebook and Google and a little sharing makes the world a happier place.
George Michael’s Twitter promise
George Michael shunning media intrusion in his personal life – no surprise.
George Michael inviting questions about his personal life on Twitter – surprising!
And it’s exactly what he did this week at a press conference: “if it’s not about the music – tweet me – it’s normally funnier on that”.
And after a tumultuous relationship with the media over the years which, he claims, has negatively impacted the gay community, who can blame him. Although you have to wonder if the journos had the last laugh though, as they made that the story and poor old George has probably been inundated with nosy tweeters…
Warhol’s 15 minutes of fame still going strong
An Andy Warhol self-portrait broke records at the auctions this week when it sold for $38.44 million (£23.58m) at Christie’s.
The original owner paid just $1,600 for the acrylic silk screen self-portrait from 1963-64. Even with inflation, that’s a pretty meaty profit.
And although Warhol’s prophecy that we would all find 15 minutes of fame in a post-modern age has borne more truth than anyone could have thought – think of all the stars that have been made via social media alone – his star has lasted far longer.
For more on graphic design, online marketing and how you can use Twitter, Facebook and Google to support your advertising contact Liquid Graphic.
What’s in it for me?
Anyone who’s ever worked in sales or who knows their F’s from their B’s (features and benefits) will be very familiar with the saying “What’s in it for me?” or WIIFM as it’s sometimes referred to. It’s basic stuff really, unless you communicate the benefit of what you’re selling, people aren’t going to buy it.
Except, these days, the modern brand-consumer relationship is more complex. That’s why this week at Liquid Graphic we’re asking do we like brands for what they give us? Or, do we like brands for what they contribute to our own personal brand?
In a fractured media market, more and more brands are using social media to get dialogue with their consumer. Most brands have fairly clear-cut ideas of what they’re looking to gain from using social media that mainly have to do with building loyalty, connecting with hard-to-reach audiences and sales promotion. But what about the consumer? What’s in it for them?
TNS Research International recently conducted a large-scale study for Marketing Week speaking to 50,000 people across 40 countries about their internet use and what they like about a brand’s online activity and what they find intrusive.
Five interesting things they found out from participants:
- 69% like online creative platforms
- 19% have brands as friends online, but they want gifts or discounts
- 70% will become friends with brands for personal benefit
- 56% become friends with brands because they like them
- 73% of people who like brands online say the ethics of a website or brand effects their decision to use them again
Source: TNS International Research, Marketing Week 28 April 2011
In our minds, the key is in the last two points.
The fact that 56% of people will show their affection for a brand to the world without an obvious reward is proof that we like brands for more than what they give us and is further proof of the inestimable power of social media.
But, before we get carried away, the last point holds a ‘handle with care’ warning for enthusiastic marketers. 73% will tune out if you over-egg the pudding. As much as your consumer may love you, there’s a fine line to be had between courting your consumer online and stalking them.
To find out more about how online marketing campaigns work and how you can use social media and search engine optimisation to support your advertising contact Liquid Graphic.
