New media marketers are adamant that their platforms and channels should be treated differently to traditional media. For decades we as marketers have been placing ads, commercials and the likes into existing channels. Channels that a certain target market are interested in and follow religiously.
We purchase or rent slots within these channels in the hope that our messages and marketing will reach its target audience. Ads that were expected to sell you things – on a channel where feedback is indirect and can take forever.
To the untrained marketer – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are seen as channels themselves. When in fact they are merely the media or medium for your channel. Using the old approach you throw in advertising or content that is similar to the work created to fall between engaging prime time shows. Ads with nothing between them, thus creating a channel of sell, sell, sell.
Social media provides instant measurable qualitative and quantitative feedback to your marketing.
Your presence on social ‘media’ are true channels. Excite and entertain your audience!
It is the role of the brand to develop their pages and their @ handles into channels. Channels that would be of interest to the target audience. Channels that entertain, educate, excite and create admiration. Channels that are so engaging that people don’t mind when the odd sales piece comes through or service announcement is slotted in.
And this is where the art of the community manager / channel manager / producers and marketers comes into play. Balancing the content calendar, scheduling upcoming content and insuring that the programming of the channel is as good as the leading TV channels.
They use data to be agile. They chop features with low ratings and iterate winning posts. They create content with twists and turns that keep them coming back. Storytelling, content marketing, an empathy and true understanding of their audience are key to their art.
That art of creating a seamless blend of content that forms a channel that no one can resist following.
Nick Allen - Marketing, Growth & Running 