Batkid – Too heartwarming to be seen as a viral marketing campaign
Can u imagine how far BATKID goes? I will tell you from my personal experience that I actually see this post being “retweet” hundred thousand times on Sina Weibo- The Chinese Twitter !
Just in case u have’nt heared of “batkid”, I will provided a short summary for you
Miles, age 5, is in remission after battling leukemia, and told the Make-A-Wish Foundation that his wish was to be “Batkid” and they mobilized the city of San Francisco to make it happen. Miles’ wish got picked up on a blog and spread like wildfire. Not surprisingly, a lot of San Franciscans were eager to help make his dream a reality. On Friday, November 15th over 11,000 people volunteered to turn San Francisco into Gotham City and cheer Batkid on as he sped around in the Batmobile, responding to countless threats and saving the city. Then they made sure to tweet and post every second of it out to the world, ensuring that Batkid is now every bit as famous as his favorite superhero.
Batkid’s wish is almost as touching as how a city seemed to come together to make this boy’s wish come true, and without social media I’m not sure how possible it would have been. I have to thank to social media which allow this love rally continue across the entire world.
After reading the post on Sina weibo, I went to youtube for the video, and other new channels in North Ameirca. Not surprisingly this story blew up my every media outlet I saw this weekend.It went sooooooo viral and On Friday #batkid was #1 on Twitter and I saw post everywhere on my facebook. The kid also got shout outs from many celebrities through various marketing channel including the President Barak Obama himself !!
Social Media not only put this story to a new level, it also also put Make-A-Wish Foundation on a whole new playing field. It may seems to be coldblood to call this a brilliant PR stunt, I really don’t mean to take away any of the pure of the batkid story. I have to admit that I went to “Make-A-Wish Foundation” several time after reading the batkid story. And I saw post saying because of the numerous amount traffic, the website even had tech difficulties
This is what I found in a blog talking about this story through a marketing aspect:
“The foundation took something it does every day – making sick kids’ dreams come true – and turned it into a global fundraising strategy. And because they accomplished the campaign through social media, mobilizing the general public and celebrities to cheer on Batkid, it comes across as entirely organic. After hearing Miles’ story, it’s hard not to want to donate or volunteer, but I doubt that anyone has thought of it as a marketing campaign. In fact, when I tried to Google: “Make-A-Wish marketing strategy” I got next to nothing. There was one blog post from 2011 and that said Make-A-Wish was going to shift from traditional to social in their marketing efforts. Mission accomplished.”
SOURCE: http://mi621.com/2013/11/18/batkid-the-coolest-viral-marketing-campaign-youve-ever-seen/
For me, this story is too heartwarming to be seen as a marketing campaign but it became so clear how fantastic of a marketing/PR event it was. Whether it was a conscious effort by make a wish or not, the beauty of it is that it raised awareness for make a wish by promoting a child’s wish. Definitely one of the coolest wishes i have seen granted!
Mobile Message App’s Monetization Strategy- What Wechat can learn from Line & KaoKao Talk.
As a loyal wechat user, I have noticed two recent move of wechat. One being starting to offer paid stickers( emoji). Secondly, The Tencent group (Wechat’s owner) has announced that they will be charging annual fee for the wechat official account. Wechat is know as the most popular free messaging app in china, their recent move interest me to do some research into how those free mobile message app monetize for profit. Here is the summary of the top monetization strategy from those mobile message apps.
1. Stickers
Stickers typically come in “packs” of between ten and twenty and can be downloaded and used within one-to-one or group chats. Selections of free sticker packs often produced by the app itself, are offered to drive awareness and encourage usage with the hope that once users are hooked they will become premium sticker users. Premium stickers packs are usually priced less than $2 per pack, they are a mixture of the app own-produced content, content form established producer such as Disney or Sony and from smaller providers who produce bespoke content especially for the app.
In my opinion, having paid sticker is the best monetize strategy for the app because it’s cheap; users enjoy those sticker very much while paying for that. It’s also a sustainable strategy; people who like using those stickers are likely to buy more new stickers as well. In July 2013,the hot Japanese message app is earning $10 millon per month alone from the stickers. Wechat’s strategy of modeling Line’s sticker monetization strategy is a very smart call.
2. Official Account
Official accounts give brands, celebrities and merchants the ability to connect and engage directly with users. Content could include basic marketing messages but more likely will take advantage of the closeness of the relationship to the user and include prizes, media, exclusive news, offers, coupons or discounts.!
There’s several different ways for the apps to monetise through official account!
1. Pay to create and promote official accounts!
2. Pay per engagement e.g. per contact added, per message exchanged, per content downloaded!
3. Pay per message e.g. brands could buy bundles of messages to send or receive!
With messaging apps having many millions of users in specific markets its easy to see how brands would be eager and willing to pay to get access to these users, particularly if users gain something valuable in return and are incentivised to connect to the official accounts.
Line is also a pioneer on this, according to the blog on “the next web” the company have to pay a one time fee (around $6,600) just to create the account. Other than that, the company will also pay to send messages. A 15 monthly message bundle for the official account is $5,000 per month while the 30 monthly message bundle is around $6,000. Wechat should definitely leverage on the official account, but I would suggest having different price levels for different size company. In that way wechat will have a bigger market for the official account, based on the fact that a big portion of official account user now are small entrepreneurs. Tencent should defiantly keep this portion of customers.
3. In-app Game Platform
Messaging app game platforms enable their users to discover and download games and other apps, play against each other and share results and leaderboards. Users can also buy virtual items and purchase extras like coins, levels, tips, boosts or anything that the user needs to progress in the game.! Revenues come from in-app purchase of virtual items in games (coins/levels/tips – things that users need to progress in the game.
The Korean app Kakao Talkhas 30 million users have played at least one of their 180 games. There are 400 million+downloads $311 million in revenue during the first half of 2013!
Currently wechat has started to offer free in-app games, which are very popular among users. This give wechat a huge potential market for further monetize through the in-app games.
Some thoughts on Google ‘s Newly Launched Product – Google Helpout
Google launched a new service online called google-helpout, a new way to get and give help over live video on Nov.4th. According to google, their goal with launching the helpout is to simply provide a convenient and efficient web platform to enable everyone, no matter where they are or what time it is, to easily connect with someone who can help.
“With Helpouts, you can choose who you get help from based on their qualifications, their availability, their price, their ratings and reviews. You can connect instantly or book in advance. You can get help from individuals or from brands you already know and trust, like Sephora, One Medical, Weight Watchers, Redbeacon (a Home Depot company), and Rosetta Stone. Once you’re in a Helpout, you can do more than just talk—you can share your computer screen, collaboratively edit a presentation, or record your Helpout. And if the experience doesn’t meet your expectations, we offer a full money back guarantee.”
How marketer can use Google helpout as a marketing tool
1. Brand Engagement
It allows different big brand to engage with their customers through providing customized service on the live video. This would allow the brand to directly interact with customers, gain in-depth knowledge from customers from all over the world. It’s a really good way for brands to strengthen their customer’s database.
2. Consumer Generate Content
By having customer write review and ratings of the helpout session, it help the helpers to directly develop the consumer generate content with no extra cost. If the helpers’ service is good, it’s very easy to build a positive brand image/ word of mouth on the platform, and it will potentially being conveyed to mass consumers off-line.
3. Improve content marketing strategy
The Helpouts improves helper’s content marketing strategy because helpers can personally and directly connect with their future clients. Even though they can’t sell the product directly, when people need help in the field, offering that help and then explain it shortly how they can find other useful information about the subject on the helper’s site, or the same problem can be solved by using their product. By doing this, helper can transfer the people needs help into potential customers. Besides that, helpers can find first hand the problems people have and they can solve them.
My concerns of the google helpout
First of all, it’s paid instead of free, so why wouldn’t I just go search YouTube? There are tons of videos that help you with all aspect of life and it’s FREE. Or I will go straight to some other answer engines. It’s said customers can get help from individuals or from brands you already know and trust. Why don’t I just go to the brand’s website or the person’s blog leave a comment and wait for the answer. It’ also free! I am so confused that is that a paid customer service for the brand or what?
In my opinion the service on google helpout can be very limited. For example, I might willing to pay hundred bucks for a well-known personal trainer to give me a video training session but definitely not pay to Sephora for beauty advice since I can just go into the store and chat with their beauty specialist.
Also, it’s hard to get real time help. The individual/ brands have high rating on the helpout are the one you most likely want to get helps from. Therefore the availability of the “helper” will become a problem.
Interesting move of google
The percent taken out of the fees people pay is the smallest thing they get out of it. The real important part comes from the fact that in order to use Helpouts you have to have a Google plus account,use Google wallet for payment and use Google Hangout for the video conversation It’s an interesting approach of creating a useful content marketing strategy of sharing to help themselves have more active users. Plus it makes money anyway and you don’t have to bother with the content. You make sure you have reliable people and they will personalize and give answer inside a conversation.
Double 11 Online Shopping Festival in China – Part 2
In this post I will mainly focus on discussing how social media contribute to the rapid growth of sale record in just 2 years for the double 11 festival.
I will first share my personal experience of how social media influence my on the double 11 festival. I actually get to know double 11 as the “world’s largest online shopping festival” this year. Before that double 11 is only the single’s day to my knowledge. I saw lots of posts on sina weibo regarding the double 11 promotion form various online retailers. At the same time, i also receive lot of “push” from several brands’ wechat official account. On the day of double 11, I saw lots of friend posts on what they have bought in this festival on weibo. There is also a banner on weibo home page counting the monetary sale volume on the day.
Alicia Yap, the head of China Internet research at Barclays, said in a report yesterday that “Weibo has become an important medium for Alibaba to promote the event and direct traffic” to its market-leading online retail portals Taobao Marketplace and Tmall.com. They believed that promoting shopping information and discussion on transactions, services and products through social media could increases the public’s interest in interacting with e-commerce and their understanding of online shopping.
Another online retail giant 51buy.com owned by tencent use its own platform wechat to carry the marketing campaign. The campaign allowed smartphone owners to view and order products available on 51buy with relative ease through WeChat’s menus, and was aimed at residents in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou. The result turned out to be excellent as out of 600,000 51buy orders made on Singles Day, orders via WeChat exceeded 80,000.
It’s clearly that social media plays an important role in this massive online shopping festival, and we will see this trend keep growing.
Double 11 Online Shopping Festival in China – Part 1
Every Nov.11th is an untraditional festival among young generations in china, which we called Single’s Day. It’s because novermber.11th is the only day in a year that have four 1s – 11.11. The single’s day is a representative product of Chinese interesting college culture.
As the young generation gradually graduate from school and get into the society, the culture of celebrating Single’s day has been brought to the society as a whole.
And now Double 11 is not only just the Single’s day for young people but became a online shopping festival when Taobao, T-mall, and 360 buy those giant online retailer take the advantage of this Single’s day culture by having massive discount promotion.
This double 11 shopping festival officially starts in the year of 2011 and it grows rapidly every year. In 2012, the transaction hit 19 billion in one day. This year, it almost double the amount and hit 36 billion!
The rationale behind this Double 11 massive online discount promotion is for online retailer to stranger the promotion period with offline sales that happen mostly in October (National Day) December (Christmas) and February (lunar new year).
This Double 11 online shopping festival is a one-day event that purely developed the online retailers. Not only they spent heavily on marketing efforts to promote the sale, the retailers also use 50% off promotion or even lower discount to attract customers. As the online shopping becoming incredibly popular in china, online retailers smartly seize the opportunity by integrating the Chinese college Culture of Single’s day. One of the factors that contribute to the success of this Double 11 Festival is the online retailers have a very clear target audience of this events, which is young generations aged 18- 26 who are tech savvy, like online shopping and social media. They also leverage this customer bases through using them as a “word of mouth” marketing channel to expose this events to mass market, their peers, family members who maybe older and may even not enjoy online shopping. But who do not like discount, especially such huge discount? In my opinion, double 11 can be serve as a trail to encourage people who don’t like online shopping or who haven’t tried the online shopping to take advantage of this sale events to actually shop online. By letting them experience the good side of online shopping, this part of market can be potentially transformed to regular online- shoppers. However, many people also said the nature of this events is the price competition, It can only raise the awareness of the online shopping industry but not actually help the industry with sustainable growth. Since Double 11 is only event that only 3 years old, I really would like to see how it grow in the future and how can it affect the online shopping industry in china as a whole.
Armani Perfume SI Instagram Marketing
One of the intagram campaigns I love most is the one Armani made for its new perfume Si.
There are a increasing number of brands that are currently using instagram as their marketing channel, among them, many already started to take advantage of the video content on Instagram. We have seen lots of marketers start to be through content innovation from where Burrery post their fashion show videos to Movie “JOBS” post their first trailer. However, there is a common limitation for those businesses that market through instagram. Marketing messages can not reach to audience on instagram who does not follow the account because of Instagram does not support share function. Armani’s Si istagram campaign is a perfect example of how to break through this limitation.
For this Perfume Si Campaign, Armani invited three influencial fashion blogger Chiara Ferragni (The Blonde Salad)，Gala Gonzalez (Amlul), Emily Johnston (Fashion Foie Gras) to each shoot a short instagram video using the moon filter.
The result is surprisingly good; where all three bloggers use their unique perspectives to showcase the message Armani want to deliver to the audiences which is Say Si (yes) to your dream. Those 3 videos got more than 50,000 likes on instagram and create a great buzz on the market for the perfume
Here are the links for the instagram video
http://instagram.com/p/caDHRAyD7F
http://instagram.com/p/cW0ZuKK0QR
http://instagram.com/p/cbPZnBiR0j
The most important facto that make this campaign successful is the use of Influencer marketing. While other brands are only posting pic/video to deliver messages through their official brand account, Armani find a breakthrough point to leverage the power of influencer and instagram videos. Lets look at the number first, Armani Official Account only have 280,000 follower, the three blogger total have more than 1,500,000 follower on instagram, which help Armani to reach 4 times of audience than it usually does. Moreover, because the video is shot by the blogger not Armani, it function as word of mouth rather than direct advertising. It is more real, authentic and closer to the audience. The influencers’ credibility also helps to build up the products’ positive image even before the launch.
There are also things marketers have to e careful when use influencer marketing strategy.
- Ensure the credibility of the influencer. Influence can somewhat act as a spokes person, therefore the brand image is closely related to the influencer. Low credibility or negative news related to the influencer may dilute the brand image.
- Co-creation is better than directly posting positive product review. Customers may consider product review from a influencer as inauthentic and unreliable, where co – creation between the influencer and brand is considering as creative, innovated and fun.
What marketers can do about Showrooming
I recently read a news article about how target trains bull-eyes on showrooming. Target has taken many strategic actions to react to this increasing phenomenon, such as starting to provide in store wifi, rolling out in-store pick up of online order, start a social media digital savings program called Cartwheel that the company built by partnering with Facebook.
http://www.startribune.com/business/227443331.html
Here are my takeways that what marketers can do with the showrooming.
There are two major marketing implications with the showrooming phenomenon: strategies marketers can take to avoid showrooming, and strategies they can take to benefit from it.
Avoid Showrooming
Marketers can implement a number of different tactics to mitigate showrooming, such as impulse buying, closing price gaps, and replenishing inventory.
Impulse Buying
Marketers can avoid showrooming by encouraging impulse buying to reduce the rational decision process. Impulse buying occurs when a person experiences a sudden urge to purchase a product that he or she cannot resist. To increase impulse buying, marketers should create exciting point-of-purchase stimuli. These promotional materials are likely increase impulse buying in the store and decrease showrooming
Close Price Gap
Marketers can also consider lessening the price gap between online and in-store retailers to eliminate the expectation consumers have about online retailers having a better price. As previously mentioned, shoppers will leave the store and purchase a product online for a price difference as low as 2.5% .Therefore, marketers should try to eliminate the motivation for buyers to search for products elsewhere by offering more competitive prices.
Replenish Inventory
Ensuring enough inventory can decrease the motivation for buyers to purchase products online. Sometimes shoppers find it frustrating to know that the products they want are out of stock, and thus turn to ordering online as their solution. To solve this problem, retailers should replenish stock levels to match buyers’ demands. However, the cost of storing inventory is high, so marketers can consider offering a delivery service to its consumers as an alternative. For example, Aldo Shoes offers free delivery to consumers’ homes if the store runs of inventory It is easy, convenient, and can motivate buyers to make more in-store purchases.
In-Store Exclusive Promotions
To create more in-store purchases, marketers can offer exclusive promotions that buyers can only get in stores (Stevens 2012). To stimulate consumer purchases, retailers can provide free gifts with any purchase, or even limited edition products sold in-store only. These promotions not only encourage in-store purchases, they also increase customer loyalty by increasing the likelihood that these customers will return.
Post-Purchase Satisfaction
Consumer satisfaction/dissatisfaction is the overall feelings or attitudes a person has about a product after it has been purchased. The greater the post-purchase satisfaction of buyers, the greater the likelihood they will return to the store again. Marketers can increase consumers’ post-purchase satisfaction by offering loyalty programs, a convenient return policy, or send thank you gifts to loyal and valued customers. These offers make buyers feel that the company is valuing them, and the stellar customer service can form interpersonal relationships between the seller and the buyer, something not likely to occur in online transactions.
Store Image
The last strategy marketers could use to avoid showrooming is to build store image to encourage in-store purchases. Store image can be referred to the store’s personality, which composes of the store’s features, location, merchandise suitability and the knowledge and congeniality of the sales staff. For example, knowledgeable sales staff can provide relevant advice to buyers, and buyers may be willing to pay a little extra for this service that they cannot get through online shopping. Moreover, store atmosphere is another significant part of store image as it can evoke certain affects in buyers. These dimensions include colors, scents, and sounds. For example, Abercrombie & Fitch associates its products with an Abercrombie fragrance to create its signature scent, something known as scent marketing. Strategic scents have been proven to increase the shopper’s dwelling time by as much as 40% in retail environments and can increase sales from 20 to 90%
Approach Showrooming
Although many marketers are currently trying to persuade their customers to move away from showrooming, there are many opportunities for online retailers who are looking to take advantage of the trend. These retailers could possibly use showrooming to position their company on the basis of price, as they try to offer lower prices compared to their brick-and-mortar competitors.
Online retailers can also provide customers with easier access to their discounts and coupons by offering their own mobile device applications. For example, Amazon currently has a mobile application which allows consumers to scan the barcode of any item in physical stores, and immediately shows the consumer the cheaper price that is offered on their website. The mobile application should be consistent and always offer the consumer a lower price than what is presented to them in a store, and this will increase the customer’s satisfaction with the online retailer and encourage consumers to repeatedly purchase using their computers.
Wechat Marketing
What is Wechat?
WeChat is a mobile text and voice messaging communication service developed by Tencent in China. It provides multimedia communication with text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, photo/video sharing, location sharing, and contact information exchange. WeChat supports social networking via shared streaming content feeds and location-based social plug-ins (“Shake”, “Look Around”, and “Drift Bottle”) to chat with and connect with local and international WeChat users.
Wechat marketing
I have been a dedicated wechat user for almost 2 years and recently I have noticed that there is an increasing number of business selling products on wechat. Therefore, in this blog I will take a close look at different channels for wechat marketing.
1.Wechat verified account/ brand home page
The verified account/brand home page provides an exclusive information push channel for business to connect with customers. Because this channel is exclusive for customers who follow the business account (those who follow the business account are most likely to be the target audience), business could send messages directly targeting their target audience. The message arrival rate is 100%, and it’s very effective. There is also a concern of marketing through this channel, the information will be overwhelmed or missed if this user follow many brands.
2. Location Marketing
Location marketing on wechat is where business put advertising or promotional messages on the signature line and reach potential customers when they use wechat “look around” feature to find people nearby. It allows business to effectively attract users that are close to the location and induce the consumption. However, on the other side, the location marketing can also limit the message coverage.
3. QR code
Users scan the QR code to add the business’s page and interact with it. User has to actively scan the QR code to add the business account, therefore, the business have to provide incentives for users to scan the QR code. When user actively scan the QR code for the business it at least prove that the user are interested in your product or the company at least. Therefore, business can market through QR code to induce the user consumption. Business could further take advantage through this QR code marketing channel by providing promotional information to potential customers.
4. Peer Review/ Advertising on “Moments”
There is a increasing number of business use moments to directly advertise their product or post positive customer reviews to build strong brand image. I saw lots of business owner who always post snap shot of positive peer review from their customers on the moment. By providing those peer review, it increase the credibility of its brand image. Business could also take advantages through encouraging their brand advocate to post positive peer review on the moments to function as a word of mouth to reach more customers.
Twitter Vs. Weibo
Sina weibo is currently the hottest microblogging service in China now. Sina weibo has grown rapidly in the last few years, growing its user bases from 0 to more than 140million users in the first 2 years, and it is keep growing. It’s becoming the must have social media tool for every web user.
I have been use sina weibo for almost 3 years, comparing with twitter; I find myself more satisfied with Sina Weibo more. I am glad that I am not the only one feel this way. Recently I have read a blog writing about 8 things that twitter can learn from sina weibo, and I found it very interesting. http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/things-twitter-can-learn-from-sina-weibo/
Also I am gonna talk about the things I personally like about Sina Weibo Rather than Twitter.
- Rich Media
One of the Sina weibo’s features that I love most is its ability to insert a wide variety of media.
Let’s take a look at the user interface for Sina weibo and Twitter When Twitter only allows you to insert pic and location, Sina weibo on the other hand enable you to insert emoji, pictures, videos, music, polls and even “long blog”. Long blog is where you can post blogger than is longer than 140 Chinese characters, and it will appear on the interface as a picture. Looking alone at the emotion feature, it has over 400 emotions for you to use! I find my self enjoy more looking through “twittes” with various media insert than simple words. With rich media insert available on sina weibo, it allows users to not only just twitted but also express themselves in different but unique ways; it also allows users who read through twitter feel more exited and interested.
2.Following Categorization
On sina weibo, you can manage your account by categorizing the people you following into different groups. It allows you to quickly locate the posts that you like to see without having all kinds of other posts’ interruption. I personally have different group categorization such as friends/ family/foodie/fashion/cosmetic etc. When I want to find more info about fashion, I just need to click the fashion category on the left side bar and then I could go through the related posts. It allows users to customize their weibo and build convenient user experience.
- “Hash tag” and hot topics
In sina weibo, we called hashtag as topics. What’s different from twitter is that sina weibo has a very detailed categorization of the hot topics. You could search for topics under several key categories like enter
tainment, sport, finance, tech, etc. This allows you to find interesting topics more convenient. That’s not all Sina weibo also have a weekly ranking chart of the hot topic depending on how many people are posting the hashtags. It also provide stat about the number of hashtag, number of weekly hashtag, and number of hashtags in 24 hours. This detailed information provide users more insights of the topic, marketers can also track the number of hashtags of their brands to gain deeper insights.
Right now Sina weibo is planning its English version platform to compete with twitter, even though it will be hard for sina since twitter has dominated the micro blogging service throughout the world, there is still opportunities for sina to grow. Twitter should be careful about sinna weibo, and probably learn from sina weibo to improve its user experience, or you never know when sina weibo may take over !
Instagram Marketing – learn from Fortune 500s
As the social media channel continues to mature, businesses are now trying different ways to connect with their customers online beyond Facebook, Twitters and in different ways. Nowadays, Instagram is becoming increasing popular among marketers. The stat shows that among 150 million unique users(both consumers and business)on Instagram, 25% of Fortune firms are already maintained a presence there, mostly posting pictures on a regular basis. Brands like Nike, Starbucks, Ralph Lauren, Whole Foods and more are all top players in the Instagram big brand space.
Recently, TrackMaven, a competitive analysis firm has released a study that exposes how these Fortune 500s are using Instagram, and gives tips on how you can use Instagram like a boss, too.
Here is the summary for some key findings
1.Photo v.s Video
Photos are performing better for Fortune 500s as the video service is somewhat new.
2.Timing
The effectiveness of instagram marketing using pictures varies little among workday(8a-9p), off-hours(9p-8a) and weekend. However, when it comes to using video content, the effectiveness is much higher during off hours suggesting “users are more likely to engage with videos when not at work, presumably because of the audio component of video,” TrackMaven said in its report.
3. Instagram Filters
There are also some interesting foundings about the photo filter usage. While nofilter photo are most used by Fortune 500s, the Mayfair filter seemed to perform the best.
4.Instagram Hashtags
According to the study, number of hashtags correlated to the success of the content.”Looking at the interactions (the sum of likes and comments) per 1,000 followers compared to the number of hashtags used, there is a strong correlation to the number of hashtags used and effectiveness up to 5 hashtags which has the highest average at 21.21 interactions per 1000 followers,” TrackMaven said in its report.
My takeaways of Instagram Marketing
From my perspective, instagram enable companies to do “Life Style Marketing” through its platform. What I mean by life style marketing is that the picture and video feature allows the company to market their product through story telling. First of all, picture and video are more engaging, attractive, one pictures can tell thousand words without boring the customers. Secondly, Customer can always project their own experience & feelings towards the pic without the Ad Script’s interruption. This could allow customers get attached to the brand therefore create sense of brand loyalty. Last but not least, by posting pictures took in real life, it closes up the distance between the brand and customers. Customers are more likely to believe it’s real, the brand is in my life, therefore may be more easily to have an emotional attach to the brand.
According the Treck Maven’s study, there are two key takeaways I think may be useful for companies uses instagram marketing.
1.Use Videos
The slow adoption rate for the Videos on Ins from Fortune 500 provide opportunities for other brands to lead ways in Video content Marketing by providing a different variety of postings. As Instagram functions as a highly visual platform, taking it a step further by adding more videos to your account can give you an advantage with your followers by being more engaging
2.Utilize Hashtags
The Study showed that 4-11 hashtags can increase up to on average 77 interaction per Ins Post. Incorporating hashtags by integrating them into your story telling process. Finding several most relative hashtag you can use and maximize the brand exposure by effectively use them! Not only the brand should use the hashtag, encourage the brand advocates to hashtag the brand! Customers’ hashtag not only provide varieties of the pictures but also in a way create a direct two way interaction between the brand and the customers. Customers’ hashtag also function as peer review and word of mouth, which could also help out reach broader potential customer bases and build positive brand image among them.