Social Media

Facebook Reactions for Brands: “Love” and “Wow”

February 26, 2016 by The Motherhood

The long-awaited Facebook Reactions launched this week, allowing users to go beyond “liking” a post. Reactions now include options for “love,” “haha,” “wow,” “sad” or “angry.” At this initial stage, users seem to enjoy the Reactions, but how will brands be affected by this update?

According to Wired, “Advertisers don’t like Facebook’s Reactions. They love them.” Seeing more specifically how users respond to ads and content can give marketers greater insight into what their consumers are looking for, which can be useful in creating future campaigns, new products and more social posts, in general.

Advertisers will now have exciting opportunities to analyze campaigns with the added insights of the emotions they evoke. Brands can experiment by posting a call to action for their followers to give feedback on different posts. We do want to mention, however, that advertisers should be aware of the context in which Reactions are used. For example, a user might select the “sad” Reaction to a brand post about a new product, only because they love the brand and wish the product were available in their area.

For now, all Reactions will be treated the same as a “like” in the algorithm. Facebook has noted that they will use the new emojis to learn more about what users like and their emotions, but it is unclear how exactly this will alter measurement and the newsfeed algorithm in the future.

Facebook is constantly trying to improve users’ timelines, and using emotions will give them a huge benefit in sharing relevant information over other social media platforms. Although all Reactions are treated equal, businesses can see the breakdown of Reactions to all of their posts on Facebook’s Page Insights. Currently, the Facebook API does not allow data gathering on Reactions, but a new GraphAPI (2.6) is expected in March or April, and we may see this additional functionality then.

If you do not already have Reactions in your Facebook feed, here is how to get them.

How do you plan to use Facebook Reactions?

Featured image from Mashable.

Snapchat for Brands: Worth the Investment?

February 16, 2016 by The Motherhood

Marketers looking to use Snapchat for brands, take note: 2016 is shaping up to be a banner year. This relative newcomer to the social media space is reported to have as many as 200 million users who send a staggering 700 million photos per day. And potentially following in the footsteps of social media giants Facebook and Twitter, Snapchat is a platform that many analysts predict will go public in 2016.

Given Snapchat’s swift growth, many marketers are eager to explore potential ways to tap its millions of active mobile users for brand awareness and engagement. Particularly for those wishing to reach moms, the question remains: is using Snapchat for brands worth the time, money and creative energy required to stand out on a platform in which content has a limited lifespan among users who are primarily 25 years of age and younger?

Our answer in 2015 was “generally, no.” However, in our continual evaluation of the social media space, our 2016 standpoint is evolving to “not quite yet, but it’s coming.”

Snapchat Adoption Among Moms

With engagement and responsiveness being two of the top qualities that lead to reader trust, bloggers with multiple social media platforms are focusing most of their energy where their audiences are most active. So far, Snapchat hasn’t made the cut.

In The Motherhood’s recent survey of more than 600 bloggers, Snapchat ranked the lowest in terms of platforms that brands request bloggers use and platforms that bloggers recommend brands use. Many influential social media moms reported having Snapchat on their mobile devices, but they use it very casually and aren’t convinced of its usefulness in connecting with the communities they’ve worked so hard to build. Less than two percent of bloggers surveyed have used Snapchat for influencer campaigns, but nearly half think there is a future in collaborating with brands via this platform.

While The Motherhood’s research revealed that 80 percent of consumers are more likely to purchase a brand they saw on social media, it appears the same isn’t holding true for Snapchat. A survey from Column Five and News Cred reports that branded promotional content isn’t making an impact on their purchasing decisions: a mere two percent reported that they “sometimes” buy something they saw on Snapchat, while a staggering 98 percent answered “rarely or never.”

Snapchat for brands — Image courtesy of AdWeek.

Via Wired, ComScore shared that while Snapchat has grown 59 percent in the last year to 40.3 million U.S. adult users, it has grown 69 percent among people age 25 to 34, which many think is approaching the tipping point for a social media platform to move from niche to mainstream.

If You Can’t Measure It, You Can’t Manage It

With adoption among the adult demographic expected to increase, and with bloggers optimistic that the platform will pick up steam, what’s next in terms of Snapchat for brands?

Just as bloggers try to strike a balance between nurturing the platforms where they find the most value and building a following on new social channels, brands are also weighing their options. Should they focus their marketing dollars on platforms on which they’ve achieved measurable, repeatable success, or test relatively unknown waters?

Currently, one of the most limiting aspects of Snapchat for brands is the lack of ability to measure and target. While other social media platforms deliver data that help marketers analyze and adjust content and delivery, it can be difficult to prove a platform’s value without being able to benchmark and track performance.

However, the rumored release of an API could change the game. Digiday summarizes some of the benefits of a Snapchat API:

“An API would help measure performance of content on Snapchat, get better insights into the type of people who are watching, where they’re located,” said Nick Cicero, CEO of Delmondo, an agency specializing in Snapchat analytics and influencers. “It would also enable brands to create more content with influencers.”

Delivering Messages That Matter

To The Motherhood, the heart of influencer marketing is looking at where a brand’s consumers engage online and how they naturally interact, and including a brand in that conversation in a relevant, authentic way. For centuries, moms have been sharing ideas and advice with their closest networks of friends in a deeply personal way, and in the modern digital age, The Motherhood helps brands be a part of those conversations online in a way that evokes trust, advocacy and action.

As The Motherhood’s social listening team continues to monitor and evaluate usage of Snapchat for brands, we’re also tapping our proprietary database to hear and apply what our nationwide network of moms is saying. The Motherhood’s campaign recommendations always reflect the platforms and message delivery we know will resonate among consumers.

If your brand would like to discuss ways to work together on an influencer marketing campaign based on our consumer insights and always-on social listening, email us at contact@themotherhood.com.

Featured image courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons user AdamPrzezdziek.

Super Bowl Brand Showdown: Which $1 Million Branded Emoji Won the Day on Twitter?

February 8, 2016 by The Motherhood

If you tune into the Super Bowl mostly for the commercials, you are not alone! In a recent study, nearly 1 in 4 viewers admitted to watching the game specifically for the commercials. At The Motherhood, we are fascinated by the new commercial trends and brand strategies around the event that we see crop up every year. For Super Bowl 50, we were especially interested in Twitter’s new advertising option for brands: a $1 million branded emoji.

Twitter started offering branded emojis back in Fall 2015, so it’s no surprise that the company is continuing this option for some of its highest paying advertisers — especially right in time for the #SB50 social chatter!

The way it works is simple: when users type a certain hashtag into Twitter, it will trigger a custom-made emoji. For example, type #SB50 into a tweet and you’ll see a football emoji appear. In fact, Twitter released several new emojis just in time for Super Bowl tweeting:

Brands partnered with Twitter to release their social emojis prior to the big game in hopes that when their commercial aired live, their hashtag – accompanied by a custom emoji – would stand out in the conversation online. The branded emojis come with a hefty price tag, but with 73 percent of Super Bowl viewers using a second screen to check social channels, the investment may have been well worth it. Here are the four brands that paid big bucks for a new kind of Super Bowl advertising — and the results, according to The Motherhood’s social listening team:

Pepsi, the official sponsor of the Halftime Show, also owned a Promoted Moment during the game’s break. The hashtag that triggered the musical notes and Pepsi can emoji was tweeted more than 431,000 times (including retweets) by more than 235,000 people yesterday. It was a clear winner among the branded emoji hashtags, generating more than 1.2 billion impressions.

Budweiser’s #GiveADamn came in as the second-most-mentioned branded emoji hashtag on Twitter, with 29,000 tweets (including retweets), 25,000 contributors and 85.8 million impressions. The #GiveADamn campaign has a strong anti-drinking and driving message, hence the new emoji with a beer bottle and car keys being dropped. For every tweet with the hashtag, Budweiser is donating $1 toward Safe Ride programs.

Bud Light’s commercial with Amy Schumer and Seth Rogen was a parody of the presidential campaign, encouraging people to support the #BudLightParty. We also noticed Bud Light received several celebrity endorsements on Twitter during the game. The campaign hashtag with the bottle cap emoji (resembling a political badge) was tweeted more than 11,600 times (including retweets) by 9,600 Twitter users, generating 62.3 million impressions.

Coming in with the fewest number of branded-emoji tweets was Verizon’s #Minute50 hashtag. This hashtag triggers a clock emoji with 50 minutes on the clock, symbolic because the company has been giving away prizes (everything from free data to Super Bowl tickets) to Verizon customers every hour on the 50 minute mark since January 24. #Minute50 received fewer than 500 tweets (including retweets) yesterday from 440 Twitter users, resulting in 4.2 million impressions. However, we want to note that because this campaign has been running for two weeks, yesterday’s tweets likely don’t accurately represent the overall reach and effectiveness of this campaign.

What’s next for branded emojis?

We look forward to seeing the other emojis, branded or not, that Twitter will reveal in the future! We’re anticipating many more to come for future events (think summer Olympic Games, the presidential campaign, etc.).

A note on Facebook: Although the Twitter branded emojis (naturally) do not appear on Facebook, use of the above hashtags on that platform was high. Again, #PepsiHalftime was by far the most used of the four. However, we found that the most shared link was to Budweiser’s #GiveADamn ad and also had the highest percentage of female users.

Did you tweet with any of Twitter’s branded emojis during the Super Bowl?

The Motherhood Recognized by Industry Peers: Earns PRSA 2016 Agency of the Year and Best in Show

January 29, 2016 by The Motherhood

The Motherhood was named 2016 Agency of the Year by the Public Relations Society of America’s Pittsburgh chapter at its annual Renaissance Awards ceremony on January 28, receiving recognition for outstanding contributions to the public relations industry. The Renaissance Awards program is a gathering of the region’s top public relations and communications professionals from leading agencies, corporations, non-profit organizations and educational institutions.

Our work received the highest honor of the evening, Best in Show, for The Stork OTC campaign, which also won a Renaissance Award the Digital Social Media Campaign category. This entry was the only entry, out of nearly 90, that received a perfect score from the judging panel*. This award-winning campaign engaged 30 influential bloggers who had experience with fertility issues for a social media campaign to generate awareness of The Stork at-home conception device’s move from prescription to over-the-counter (OTC) availability. The program generated 57 million impressions, a trending hashtag and contributed to the device selling out at CVS/pharmacy online.

The Motherhood also received a Renaissance Award in the Online and Social Blogger Outreach category for the Brain Chase campaign. This 2015 campaign included a partnership with the team at Brain Chase, a new online “adventure learning” program for kids, aimed at helping them avoid summer learning loss. The Motherhood engaged a strong team of influential bloggers to help raise awareness and drive signups for the summer 2015 program. During the four-month campaign, the blogger team drove one-third of total sign-ups.

In both the Digital Social Media Campaign category and Community Relations & Public Service category, The Motherhood earned Awards of Merit for the P&G Power of Clean campaign. For this campaign, The Motherhood partnered with P&G and Ketchum to execute a campaign behind the P&G Children’s Safe Drinking Water Program. Twenty bloggers initiated a conversation about “Power of Clean” and drove video views, helping to deliver a donation of 126,000 days of clean water.

The Motherhood’s entry for the United Nations Foundation’s Shot@Life Campaign was also recognized with an Award of Merit in the Community Relations and Public Service Category. For this campaign, we worked with United Nations Foundation’s Shot@Life to engage 50 influential bloggers to participate in a “blog relay,” sharing inspiring quotes on blogs and social channels. Each comment, like or share of their posts triggered one vaccine donation, with an overall total of 60,000 donations in four weeks.

Our partner agency on the recent Bolthouse Farms Kids program, Smith Brothers Agency, also took home a Renaissance Award in the Marketing Communications category for the “Snack Mob Sampling Tour.” To elevate the Bolthouse Farms Kids brand in Pittsburgh and generate awareness of its new products in partnership with Smith Brothers, The Motherhood enlisted a powerhouse team of influential Pittsburgh moms to attend a series of local market #SnackMob truck events throughout the city and encouraged their readers to do the same. Bloggers also used their social media posts to spread the word about the #SnackMob contest and to document their own experiences with this one-of-a-kind snack truck.

The Motherhood team extends its gratitude for our brand partners and nationwide network of bloggers with whom we had the honor of creating this award-winning work.

Last night’s Agency of the Year and campaign recognition follows a very successful 2015 ceremony, during which The Motherhood took home the first-ever People’s Choice Award, after our campaign around Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood with The Fred Rogers Company received the most votes from the PR professionals in attendance. Beyond the ceremony, The Motherhood was also named the second-fastest growing marketing company in our headquarters city in 2015, as well as AMA Marketer of the Year.

Follow us at @TheMotherhood on Twitter and on our blog for the latest industry insights and leading research, or email us to learn more about our offerings.

*Entries were independently evaluated by a panel of judges from PRSA’s East Central District, comprised of chapters from Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Western and Northwestern Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentucky.

Round-up of the Top 10 Social Marketing Predictions for 2016

January 4, 2016 by The Motherhood

It has been a memorable year in social media, with many new platform functions and trends, but the best may be yet to come. We can’t help but be excited for all of the 2016 marketing predictions we’ve seen floating around and what’s in store for social media in the coming year.

Not enough time to read the heavy influx of marketing predictions for 2016? No problem! The Motherhood has skimmed the most newsworthy pieces and summarized the top trends.

Marketing Predictions for 2016

Here are the social media trends you need to know for the upcoming year:

1. Ad Blocking shifts eyes to organic and social

The quick rise of ad blocking in 2015 will lead to an increase in organic methods of reaching targeted consumers in 2016.
Marketers will need to rethink how and where to allocate advertising dollars as the effectiveness of online ads is drastically reduced.
This will lead to an increase in social media, native advertising and influencer marketing campaigns.

2. Shift from automated to authentic

Because online consumers have developed the keen skills to identify and ignore ads and automated sponsored content, authentic, personal content will rise as marketers realize its value in connecting with online audiences.
Simply searching for influencers in your space and asking them to push out stale messages will become less effective; greater strategy will be needed to engage key influencers.
Marketing that is less disruptive and more focused on fostering relationships will be conductive to building a loyal customer base.

3. Creativity will thrive

With online content becoming overcrowded, it will take creativity and originality to flourish.
Brands will continue to find more unique ways to engage with their audiences.

4. Experience = shared value

Content will continue to fuel the customer experience.
More and more consumers turn to third parties, such as online influencers, as trusted sources of information on brands/products.
Brands will recognize more that linking an experience or story with a brand/product better resonates with consumers than facts and figures.
Humanizing your brand helps to create shared trust through personal experience.

5. Engagement > Reach

Marketers will place a greater focus on identifying meaningful measurement metrics of engagement with sponsored content.
By evaluating engagement of online campaigns, marketers can gain better insights from, and connection with, targeted audiences.
We’ve already seen many of our clients begin to look at engagement metrics rather than impressions in our programs, as they recognize the value in targeted engagement.

6. Data and insights

Analytics and social insights will become more readily available, leading to a jump in automated data analysis and implementation of big data insights to create better social messaging.
Rather than trying to do it all, marketers will focus on key performance indicators and creating more valuable insights aligned with those indicators.
Using data to develop more personalized experiences for consumers will create more value for both businesses and customers.

7. Instant Gratification AND Snapchat

In-the-moment posts will dominate with the rise in popularity of Periscope and the addition of Facebook Live Streaming.
While reaching consumers organically via SnapChat is not a cost-effective option, SnapChat will become the “New TV.”
As this Ad Age article perfectly states, “Think appointment-watching, awareness and buying eyeballs.”

8. Video, video, video

70 percent of companies now say video is the most effective tool in their online marketing belts, and two out of three businesses expect it to dominate their strategy going forward.
Google now includes video content in search results, and Facebook and Bing have started offering video options for advertisers.
Using video to tell stories can be used as an advantage by marketers to effectively convey a brand message.
Social video is rapidly rising, and videos need to be tailored for each platform and target audience.

9. Social messaging and messaging apps

Messaging apps have seen explosive growth and have already evolved as a customer service feature.
While messaging apps are still a mystery, big brands are testing them out as marketing channels.
Messaging apps are the most-used of all category apps, meaning there is a largely untapped potential for advertising in this space.

10. Social isn’t free

The exponential growth of brands on social has led to less organic reach, so increases in social marketing spending will continue to increase.
Simply promoting posts or getting your message incorporated in authentic content from key influencers will increase in order to maintain a share of voice.
Online influencers know their value and demand for them as key content creators continues to increase, so navigating these relationships will become trickier.

The recurring theme we found throughout the plethora of predictions is that the customer will be heard in 2016, and as a result, marketers will be using more data and insight in their campaigns, and will need to implement authentic, personalized content programs.

Which predictions do you think are most accurate?