8 Reasons Why Social Media Dominates Online Advertising

A just-released US study of digital marketers reveals that Social Media has become the most dominant form of online advertising.

Another recent study, by Marin Software, (State of Digital Advertising 2018) demonstrated a similar pattern for global advertising.

In fairness, we should note that social media advertising still has a long way to go to achieve a similar position in New Zealand. According to the NZ IAB Q1 2018 report, search is far and away the biggest player in online advertising in New Zealand, accounting for 62% of total expenditure. Social adspend is a mere 5% of the NZ total.

Why the discrepancy? What do global marketers know about Social Media Advertising that Kiwi marketers don’t?

Social Media possesses some key attributes that other online advertising options don’t.

Such as?

Thomas Coppen starts the ball rolling with these key points:

1 You don’t have to guess at your audience.
Their gender, age, location, interests, work, friends and so much more is provided for you. Discovering your target demographic has never been easier.

2 Social Media nurtures brand loyalty.
71% of consumers are more likely to make purchasing decisions based on what they discover about brands on social media, making social media a great opportunity for create life-long customers.

Digital marketing guru Neil Patel adds a few suggestions of his own:

3 Peer Recommendations Happen with the Click of a Like

According to a recent report by Econsultancy, 75% of people in the 18 – 26 age group used recommendations on social sites in product research before making a purchase. One of the nice sides to social media is once you have a presence on Facebook, Twitter, or Google+, peer recommendations will happen when someone likes your page, mentions your Twitter handle, or tags your brand name. When someone takes these actions, their connections will see them which may help your business get discovered by others with that perceived seal of approval.

4 Respond to Criticism in Real Time

One of the worst problems when it comes to search engine results, aside from not coming up in them at all, is having something negative come up. Online reputation management is a thriving service thanks to rip off reports, bad reviews, and other damaging articles about a business. Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do to counter these in search engine results themselves.

Whenever you are presented criticism on social media, however, you will have a chance to turn those complaints into compliments by responding back to them in real time. There is a lot of great information today, including books like The Now Revolution that help businesses learn how to plan for, find, and manage real-time crises in the social media space. Knowing how to do this is essential to showing current and potential customers how much you care about everyone’s satisfaction with your business.

5 Buy Your Way in Front of Your Target Audience

Thanks to Facebook Advertising, StumbleUpon Ads, Promoted Tweets, and other social media advertising, businesses can put their content in front of social media audiences. This is a great way to generate traffic to your website, fans for your Facebook page, and visibility for your messages on social media platforms.

And Mashable highlights three more key benefits:

6 Social ads deliver brand equity and free traffic

When you buy search ads, you get exactly what you pay for: clicks.

When you buy social ads, you not only get the clicks you pay for, but you also receive the free impressions and clicks from users sharing your ads with their networks.

This creates an immediate halo effect for your campaign, increasing your brand equity and raising your overall return on ad spend.

For example, when you promote a tweet on Twitter, you get retweets and favorites for free. When you promote your pin on Pinterest you get re-pins for free. When you promote a popular post on Facebook, you won’t get charged for users sharing your post with others.

Across all social platforms, the more engaging your post, tweet, pin or product, the more engagement and brand equity you can potentially create. That’ll drive more traffic…for free.

7 Social ads trigger purchases in visual product categories

Social ads offer a larger canvas to tell your message, especially on visual platforms, like Pinterest and Instagram.

These social networks are ideal for lifestyle product categories like fashion and home decor, where using content to inspire consumers is key to triggering purchases. These social networks are ideal for lifestyle product categories like fashion and home decor, where using content to inspire consumers is key to triggering purchases.

On Pinterest and Instagram, you can promote a pin or photo of an influencer wearing your product. The expanded visual canvas enables you to showcase your brand and products in a native environment that feels like magazine content. You can’t do any of that with search ads.

8 Social ads drive long-term engagement

Creating social ads that resonate with consumers can lead to longer-term, deeper engagement because consumers become personally involved with — and more connected — to your products.

This is in stark contrast to search ads, which are only seen by consumers right before the point of purchase.

On Twitter, a promoted tweet invites consumers to have a conversation around the content, helping it spread and encouraging others to join in. On Pinterest, a promoted pin encourages users to pin it to a board, which they may reference multiple times as they plan what they are going to do. Compare this to finite search ads, which only appear when you search.

Social advertising is an effective way to get consumers to engage with your message in a thoughtful and organic way.

Social ads create stronger long-term value as the content continues to get amplified across consumers’ networks.

By spending on social instead of search, your brand connects with consumers who ultimately drive traffic and sales to your site.

So what are you waiting for? Get started with Social Media Advertising and steal a march on your competitors.

Not sure how to maximise your Social Media? Check out our online courses:

The Principles & Practice of Social Media Marketing

This is a thirteen-part eCourse providing a comprehensive introduction to Social Media Marketing, from the Basics to detailed instructions on how to build and run a Social Media Marketing programme.

For more details of the Social Media Marketing online course, please click here.