Social is in the driving seat but don’t forget about other channels

By Jenny Stanley, MD and Founder, Appetite Creative 04 Jul 2019

Social media has become the driving force behind not just marketing but the overall business plan and it is increasingly forming the basis for the mobile and desktop content, look and feel. Social is incredibly powerful when it is done well and more importantly, it can support your overall business plans and brand messaging.

So how does social support your business strategy? Brands need guidance and guidelines and to learn that it is not about pumping out stuff. It needs to be consistent, engaging content delivered across all channels. Tone and ‘voice’ of the brand is key. Brands need to bring to life and create an editable format for everyone within their company to use. 

The build, which was completed in under 5 weeks, used the most recent and modern web trends to create a truly dynamic, fast and engaging experience for the user.  This hybrid model was used in conjunction with Wordpress as a backend platform and API provider and all the content feeding the website is provided by connection to a backend API. 

At the front side, the website was created as a SPA (Single-Page Application) using only JavaScript / Node, creating the most immersive and dynamic UX. By using Wordpress backend, the Foshpa Marketing team users are able to use a well known system and can easily update the website content, even with limited coding skills. 

They can also duplicate content more easily through social, mobile and web channels. The objective was to create a high impact, agile and cutting-edge site that delivers a great experience for visitors and showcases quality content that has been built from the knowledge garnered by the social channel. 

There is a growing trend towards investing in website technology to ensure that the online destination for your customers is not left behind.  Be clear on what is not the brand message and focus on what looks and sounds good. 

 If we think about how consumers use social, we need to look at the fact that 1% create content, 9% comment and 90% observed. This means that we have to bake in measurement tools to ensure that we recognise each observation and build future content, creative and messaging around this.

The key to being successful is to become practitioners and not theorists and get behind the data and use the data and insights to support the social strategy. 

What is the image you want to project to the consumer? What is the message you want to get across? Then take these two questions and build the answer around creating a sense of belonging and tapping into how the consumer ‘feels’.  This means creating a web and mobile destination site that showcases authentic, genuine content that has real business value and provides consistency across your web pages, mobile and social. 

Don’t silo social within marketing. Make it part of the broader strategy and build mobile and web pages that support this to create a truly dynamic, fast and engaging experience for the user - on social and beyond. 

Appetite Creative will be part of MAD//Picnic on 10 July. Meet the team at their picnic table!