Looking Beyond Likes & Shares

The term social engagement typically means brands interacting with consumers by encouraging them share or like their content. While this is true, today’s consumers want incentives for ‘liking’, ‘following’, or simply showing interest in brands. The first step to engagement is capturing consumers’ attention; and how better to do this than by enticing them with incentives.

Thismoment’s research on what drives consumers to socially connect with brands shows that:

• 70% people followed brands for contests or sweepstakes (Column Five Media, Get Satisfaction).
• 46% consumers ‘liked’ brands on Facebook for the incentives that came from engaging with the brand (CMO Council).

What makes this interesting is the 2011 CRM Study by IBM. According to the study:

• For consumers, discounts and purchase are the biggest motivating factors to follow brands.
• However, brands have rated these parameters right at the bottom, and think they’re being followed for the product/company information.

This wide gap in perception means brands could risk missing out on valuable engagement opportunities. Social marketing involves more than featuring promotional content. The smart move would be to make consumers feel privileged by rewarding them for connecting with your brand.

Improving Engagement with Incentives

1. Selecting the Right Channels & Identifying Target Audiences: Aiming contests and discounts at customers who aren’t really interested hampers engagement. Successful engagement depends on selecting the right channels and identifying where your target audiences is. How can brands do this?
   • Using social monitoring tools like Thismoment’s Brand Monitor will help determine where the customers are and what are their needs. Brands can then proceed to design contests, offer discounts and engage with them.
   • Selecting the right channels also depends on your objectives. E.g. Facebook and YouTube are great for visually rich, UGC contests, while Groupon, LivingSocial etc. are perfect for daily deals.



2. Getting Around Facebook Timeline Obstacles: The absence of default landing tabs on the Timeline means no CTAs/offers can be featured on the Cover image. Brands can overcome this by:
   • Including the CTAs, Offers in the Custom Tabs: This means people who are truly interested in availing the discounts will ‘like’ the page and engage with the brand.
   • Marketers can take advantage of Facebook Offers, which drives new people to their Timeline and engages with existing customers.
   Or
   • Customizing their Facebook Presence by using Thismoment’s DEC Platform: Unlike the Timeline, where visitors have to specifically select from custom tabs for contests/offers, the DEC for Febreze takes users straight to their Facebook tab. To know more about the offers/coupons, users are required to ‘like’ Febreze. Just like in the old times!
3. Using Contests for Engagement: For brands looking to improve social engagement through contests, here’s a valuable tip:
   • Pick Prizes that Build Relationships: Although offering tangible rewards (money, tablets etc.) will direct heavy traffic to your social channels, participants may not further engage with the brand, after receiving prizes. For long-lasting relationships, we suggest offering intangible rewards that will convert customers to brand ambassadors.

   To increase user-engagement and promote their film, Beautiful Creatures, Warner Bros. launched a UGC contest on Facebook and Brand Site (created on Thismoment’s DEC platform). The contest requires users to upload videos telling why they’re the biggest fans of the film. The prize? A trip to Comic-Con San Diego for the Beautiful Creatures panel or a visit to the film’s set.

4. Timing it Right: Offering frequent discounts and freebies may not work for brands on tight budgets. Considering how crucial these incentives are for engagement, brands sometimes find themselves in a fix. The solution? Nothing works better than offers timed with the holiday season. According to Forrester, during key holiday periods in 2011, over 70% holiday buyers preferred online shopping to traditional stores because of the great deals available.

Conclusion

Although marketers have been reasonably successful at amassing shoppers by offering incentives, today’s social space requires the creation of brand ambassadors. Therefore marketers are focusing on offering intangible rewards that are crucial for strengthening brand-customer relationships and improving engagement. While consumers rate discounts/offers as top priority, it’s encouraging to see brands working towards diminishing the perception gap between what consumers actually want, and what brands think they expect from them. After all, understanding consumer expectations is the first step to successful engagement.

- Shama Ahmed
Thismoment

Andrew Sielen

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