As we discussed earlier this month, the number of social media channels through which brands can interact with their customers and prospects has expanded dramatically. And while the number has increased, the most significant development is not the volume of social networks, but the ways in which each channel works.
The hot new social channels, such as Instagram, Pinterest, Vine and Snapchat, are all highly visual. Consumers flock to these to share images and videos — either things they’ve seen online and want to “pin” to come back to later, or real-life experiences they are sharing.
While Twitter and Facebook make use of images, they still rely heavily on text-based communication. The newer social networks are all about powerful, engaging images and video that captures a user’s attention and matches their interests.
This is an important distinction for the companies the help SMBs advertise. In their earliest incarnation, Facebook and Twitter were text-heavy formats, making it easy to borrow best practices from search ads, sometimes even leveraging PPC pricing models. That’s not the case with these newer networks, nor is it even necessarily true for Facebook and Twitter at this point. It would be shortsighted to say that copy doesn’t matter on Instagram and Pinterest, but it is fair to say that the visual matters more than anything, whether it’s a picture or a video.
So, while helping an SMB produce video content for their website or pre-roll ads, its important to also think how that video content may fit into Instagram or Vine. While there will be opportunities to use the same content across multiple channels, you’ll also need to consider the voice of each channel, crafting a message that fits the audience and the time constraints. Brands want to take advantage of new channels with growing audiences – it’s important for their media providers to help them deliver the kind of creative that makes a difference within these environments.
