Social media can either be the biggest waste of your energy and time, or one of the most rewarding experiences. And all of this depends on how you approach it. Here are some of our learnings from years of social engagement which we hope will help you set off on the right footing.
Whenever you are communicating online, you must be doing this through the lens of your company or the brand that you’re attempting to promote. By that I don’t mean you need to be robotic or engage solely in corporate speak, but simply that when you are developing your social media strategy, you need to be thinking about the messages you want to convey and, naturally enough, you want to think about what you are trying to achieve here.
Is it to drive traffic and leads to your website? Or is it to increase your profile and influence and to promote your brand to a wider audience? Or is it to counter some negative PR and address a reputational threat to your business?
All of these scenarios will result in very different approaches so this part of the planning stage needs to be thought through very carefully.
“A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he gets to know something.”
Wilson Mizner
Another important factor (which should be one of your first considerations) is your target audience. What do you know of them? What are their broad demographic characteristics, their likes and dislikes, their motivations, their influencers, peers and adversaries.
So before you start to engage them, you better know more about them. And what better way than to spend some time listening to them? Online: within the channels you are planning on engaging with them in!
Consider organising a social management dashboard to gather all of your social media threads in the one place, like Hootsuite or Sprout Social. That way you can set up search filters on each channel (particularly useful for the fast moving channels like twitter which is akin to a stream of consciousness – or unconsciousness sometimes!).
Once you know what your target audience is looking for, and you understand a little of how you communicate with this audience appropriately, this will give you confidence when you start to engage with them.
Most business owners treat social media like a loud hailer – one way and repetitive. This is the perfect strategy to alienate your customers and advocates. How you communicate is almost as important as what you communicate.
You need to be guided by the rule of thirds:
Which leads me to the next point:
Dialogue and conversations work best when they’re natural and free flowing yet many people engaging in social media forget to be sociable and sound like a robot.
So, be natural and treat your audience for what they are individuals and a human! Not a radical thought but an important one.
Be real…
In the next blog we’ll take a look at the the remaining 5 factors from this series. Thanks for reading.
With a wide range of products, applications and service offerings, HCL could be seen as demanding. Yet, by integrating segmentation techniques on company size, sector and purchase history, we are able to choose the audiences to send emails to, and uncover what works.
Each email is scoped, the audience identified, professionally written, designed and then integrated with tracking from within the email as well as through analytics.
High-value, low-volume email marketing requires a specialised approach. One that speaks the right language to partners, clients and prospects, whilst underpinning the values that make Unloq’s services unique.
With split lists, containing some shared and some unique content, we have created variety without the overhead of coming up with three completely new emails every time. Precise, targeted and confident – just like our client.
The ability to persuade visitors and generate leads in a field as challenging as mergers and acquisitions needed a very careful and considered approach. Attention to detail and the use of the right language are crucial to gaining the trust and confidence of the audience.
We worked closely with the client, embedding ourselves in their business so that we could learn more about the M&A marketplace, we mapped their audience and delivered two websites with specific strategic goals for their business. They remain the main lead-drivers for this rapidly growing enterprise.
How to prepare a structural engineering practice for growth? Firstly, make the website have real quality and impact. To communicate the values of the business as well as match the expectations of the target property owner and partners for the business.
The eventual site focuses on the outcome of working with our client, high-end solutions to reinvigorate homes to fit with a luxurious London and Home Counties lifestyle.
It should be simple to find leads for EV charging in the South East of England, but sometimes what looks easy is, in fact, a real technical challenge.
Firstly, whilst there is a lot of searching for EV points, we only want to target those who want an installation. Secondly, we also need to avoid congested areas where there is only on-street parking. Finally, they had a preference for commercial, not residential installations.
Not so simple, but we plugged away and found a steady flow of electric leads.
We’re familiar working for clients with complex audience requirements. For Technical Resources it is a constant balancing act between job candidates and employers. If you don’t have enough flow of each, then the business struggles.
We helped them create specific sections with unique messages for each audience to give them the best chance of generating leads. Each section is then tracked independently so that we can get the client to candidate ratio just right.
Whilst Nautilus is setting the standard for real-life skippering courses, they recognise there is a substantial audience for online learning.
Having established their new website, we integrated their online courses and set up several routes into registering or trying their online masterclasses as well as tracking paid enquiries into the system to measure relative performance.
If you’re challenging an established industry where cost, supply chain and value is a mystery, then what better way to differentiate than do the opposite.
We created transparent pricing, clear discounts, delivery expectations and global dispatch. Each product had about a thousand combinations, so clients could order exactly what they wanted.
With an increasingly global customer base, a broad range of client needs, and a growing internal team overseeing proposals and quotations, HCL were in need of consolidation.
We helped them bring together all their prospects and clients in one place and recommended ways of segmenting the customer base. They are quoting more often, more quickly and closing more business and, by attaching the CRM to their email platform, also being able to build more repeat business.
The practice had just recruited a manager and was looking to bring together all their enquiries and proposals into one place. We recommended, configured and launched a CRM for them that gave them visibility over all their leads.
As they developed their services, and added to their team, we let them adapt and shape the process to remain ahead of the pack.
An engineering firm wanted to build business but also be equipped to grow. With a new practice manager in place who was committed to digital transformation, we integrated CRM, task management and project tracking systems to create a system that works for them.
It now tracks quotes, commissions business, pushes through deadlines, keeps clients aware of progress and helps them deliver high quality structural engineering projects on time and on brief.
When we first started working with Domin, we introduced them to Airtable and also recommended a CRM to streamline their account management. It was the start of a beautiful relationship.
They now use Airtable effectively as an ERP system for their order management and global supply chain, and the CRM drives the growth in sales and clients across the world as they add to their product lines.
Offering short leases and contracts to small and startup businesses leads to challenges for Flexspace. Every unit is up for renewal every year. Furthermore, with standard attrition within small enterprises, there is always space coming available.
Yet, with a building database and a ready list of prospective, as well as existing clients, we have advised them on systems and strategies to convert more of their database and to see problems for fill rate before it becomes a critical problem.
With a growing reputation, but skippering being seen as a one-hit sale, it seemed that repeat business would be a challenge. However, Nautilus had two strategies we were able to support with very effective marketing campaigns.
Firstly, they now have an Alumni network called ‘The Tribe’ who regularly go on flotillas with each other, coordinated by Nautilus. Secondly, they have catamaran deliveries where different teams are assembled to take their boats point to point, often across oceans – another level of experience!
Our client had already adopted some systems, and whilst using cloud-based technologies, it was still mainly mail, calendar, documents and spreadsheets.
We worked closely with them first putting in place a CRM, then a no-code platform to run their projects and have continued to make them more efficient, paperless and collaborative than ever before.
When we initially worked with Nautilus, they had grown successfully on an inbox and a spreadsheet. For a small business, that makes sense and keeps it simple, but it becomes harder the more conversations, quotes and bookings are managed.
It became clear that they needed to collaborate and track more.
With an envious Tripadvisor rating, their customers expect the perfect experience. Having scoped out their requirements, we helped them choose the right CRM and then helped scope it out to fit their needs perfectly. Now their office team of four can work together, using a range of communication channels to get the job done.
One extensive website with an enormous range of pages and content, where offers adapt every month to the demands of the clients, and capacity changes meaning that conversions never stay the same.
So, we report and analyse every month, understand how the different areas of the website are performing, receive briefings from our client and adapt for the month ahead.
Two websites offering a wide range of services, where quality leads are of high value, but there are large volumes of time-wasters, it is vital to ensure that every lead is accounted for.
Our ‘secret source’ for them tracks from Ads, Organic, Google Analytics 4 and in their CRM to make sure that we know exactly the cost of every good opportunity. In that way, we can flex accordingly.
It’s always a challenge taking an established business, with all the heritage that comes with the old. However, backed by a supportive client, we took them from a ‘WordArt’ style to something that is as flexible as their clamps!
You can see the nod to the product range, but this is such a versatile logo, portrait, landscape, white out of colour. It allows imagery, buttons and offers to pop as it has clarity and style.
Taking on an unexpected full rebrand in thirty days was not necessarily part of the remit, but we’re always up for a challenge.
New iconography in place with a subtle and yet distinct nod to hydraulics and the ‘D’ for Domin. We also founded and formed a proper brand book to ensure that consistency remains in place for cross-media activity.
It’s too easy to be carried away by the lifestyle and adventure of the Nautilus crew, from the Pacific to the Med, they deliver award-winning sailing experiences.
However, we are not helping them sell holidays, they sell skipper courses so that clients can sail their own yachts and catamarans. So the content is geared around this. It’s still beautiful, but it speaks to the right audience.
What is there not to love about kids and garden play? The photos are great, settings wonderful and the structures are pretty awesome. But, to be honest, you can’t have photos of children included and then all the structures are based around the same ‘ingredients’.
So, you need to become storytellers, as tree houses and adventure play is about the joy and fun to be had by small and large adventurers as their ideas spark into life. It’s the story we tell!
The most valuable aspect of Domin’s products is hidden in the ‘secret sauce’ of how they build the most efficient and compact hydraulic systems. The products are well-engineered, but the outcomes
Mergers and acquisitions marketing imagery rife with stock photos of business meetings, office blocks and cityscapes. But Unloq is different. The name is the focus: to unlock opportunities, unpick information and open up value for clients.
So the imagery is simple, clean and relates to the process of unlocking rather than the environment. We recommended striking black and white imagery that nails the brief, engages the viewer and turns attention to messaging and actions, whilst complementing the brand palette.
With a wide range of products, applications and service offerings, HCL could be seen as demanding. Yet, by integrating segmentation techniques on company size, sector and purchase history, we are able to choose the audiences to send emails to, and uncover what works.
Each email is scoped, the audience identified, professionally written, designed and then integrated with tracking from within the email as well as through analytics.
High-value, low-volume email marketing requires a specialised approach. One that speaks the right language to partners, clients and prospects, whilst underpinning the values that make Unloq’s services unique.
With split lists, containing some shared and some unique content, we have created variety without the overhead of coming up with three completely new emails every time. Precise, targeted and confident – just like our client.
When it comes to mergers and acquisitions, clarity of message and presentation is paramount. We worked closely with the client, writing a script, choosing a voice-over artist, stitching together images, video and illustrations.
The two videos were short enough to share on social media, but professional enough to take pride of place on the website – raising the profile and credibility of Unloq and with more to come.
How best to display some of the finest tree houses and climbing frame builds in the UK? We used a combination of close-up and drone footage to showcase Gardenatics’ custom builds.
It makes the website stand out, differentiating from the competition and justifying the quality and value on display. It has helped them continue to win new clients across England and Wales looking for that premium option.
One extensive website with an enormous range of pages and content, where offers adapt every month to the demands of the clients, and capacity changes meaning that conversions never stay the same.
So, we report and analyse every month, understand how the different areas of the website are performing, receive briefings from our client and adapt for the month ahead.
Two websites offering a wide range of services, where quality leads are of high value, but there are large volumes of time-wasters, it is vital to ensure that every lead is accounted for.
Our ‘secret source’ for them tracks from Ads, Organic, Google Analytics 4 and in their CRM to make sure that we know exactly the cost of every good opportunity. In that way, we can flex accordingly.
It’s too easy to be carried away by the lifestyle and adventure of the Nautilus crew, from the Pacific to the Med, they deliver award-winning sailing experiences.
However, we are not helping them sell holidays, they sell skipper courses so that clients can sail their own yachts and catamarans. So the content is geared around this. It’s still beautiful, but it speaks to the right audience.
What is there not to love about kids and garden play? The photos are great, settings wonderful and the structures are pretty awesome. But, to be honest, you can’t have photos of children included and then all the structures are based around the same ‘ingredients’.
So, you need to become storytellers, as tree houses and adventure play is about the joy and fun to be had by small and large adventurers as their ideas spark into life. It’s the story we tell!
An engineering firm wanted to build business but also be equipped to grow. With a new practice manager in place who was committed to digital transformation, we integrated CRM, task management and project tracking systems to create a system that works for them.
It now tracks quotes, commissions business, pushes through deadlines, keeps clients aware of progress and helps them deliver high quality structural engineering projects on time and on brief.
When we first started working with Domin, we introduced them to Airtable and also recommended a CRM to streamline their account management. It was the start of a beautiful relationship.
They now use Airtable effectively as an ERP system for their order management and global supply chain, and the CRM drives the growth in sales and clients across the world as they add to their product lines.
With a number of local teams, we needed to come up with an ad strategy that ensured that the value of the job, and the journey time would make profitable commercial and residential enquiries for Chargebase.
A lightweight, geographically tight, precisely worded set of campaigns was plugged into the business. And the lights went on!
The challenge with Nautilus isn’t the product, it’s amazing! The test is to avoid sailing enthusiasts and drill down to their audience: people who want to learn to skipper.
We have worked closely with Nautilus for over ten years distilling down a range of very precise advertising campaigns to deliver exactly what they wanted. A flow of future skippers looking for adventure.
Working in a high ticket specialist field means that every visit has value. Rather than focusing on volume, this was a more meticulous project which was driven by quality of enquiry as well as volume.
We recognised that there were certain keywords which significantly outperformed and provided the kinds of leads Unloq were looking for. We split the proposition into two websites for different audiences and focused each website for different keyword clusters. Client acquisitions soared.
Having worked with Flexspace on two iterations of their website the biggest challenge has been leveraging their sites and types of property to build a range of keywords to reach business owners.
Whilst the first website was effective in building traffic, we learned so much from that process that round two (six years later) was another step uo. Structure and internal linking was optimised for a wide range of relevant keywords which built a steady flow of converting organic traffic to Flexspace.
Tree houses and climbing frames are really easy to share, every family loves some active play. However, for Gardenatics we needed to make sure that we selected the right strategies for the right platforms.
In particular, the Pinterest channel we created for them gave great scope and leverage for the brand, as photos of builds were pinned far and wide and, given the bespoke nature of the constructions – future customers knew the best brand to help them with their garden was, of course, our client.
Unloq’s aim is to stand out and be different in the M&A world, but at the same time, to give confidence in the services they offer. They have to both be confident and discreet, persuasive but measured.
Our social media strategy is to ensure that we use a combination of videos, stings, dynamic messages and text to continue to reinforce the values and services which make our client the best route to inorganic business growth.
Intent led, tracked and accounted for profitable marketing spend
Motivated enquiries, in the buying cycle, who fit your ideal target market
Make processes more efficient, thorough, predictable and measurable
Fast and reliable cash-generative e-commerce and lead generation websites
Rankings with purpose, targeting your converting keywords
Modern, digital, flexible brand, guidelines, messaging and identity
Short, sharp videos designed specifically for the right media channel
Smart, precise imagery demonstrating design with purpose
A clearly segmented customer base with fine-tuned strategies for repeat business
A connected analytics layer providing confidence in tactical and strategic marketing work
Refined, considered and targeted persuasive copy with calls to action
Well-considered, precise, relatable and polished content
Focused varied marketing content, adapted to suit customer profiles
A store where the stock, turnover, margins and yield dwarfs the marketing spend
Win and retain more business by selecting the right CRM and systems
Joined up, cloud-based systems which optimise operations