MEDIA - YouTube May 2017 Leaderboard

The May 2017 Leaderboard for advertising on YouTube is available. 

Enjoy and learn from those who are leading this form of media advertising. YouTube is now the leading source of video content and is outperforming TV channels by a wide margin.

YouTube May 2017 Leaderboard

DIGITAL - Research: The Growing Importance of Visual Content

Visual content has become vital to marketing, especially in the world of social media.

A recent study by Venngage surveyed over 300 online marketers and find out exactly how visuals influenced their marketing strategies in 2016, and what their plans were for 2017.

According to the survey, 77% of marketers stated that 71% to 100% of the content they published in 2015 contained visuals. Of that 77%, 40.5% of marketers stated that 91% to 100% of the content they published in 2015 contained visuals.

When asked about their use of visuals in their content strategy during the year 2016, 83.5% of marketers stated that 71% to 100% of their content contained visuals, and 53% of those marketers said that 91% to 100% of their content contained visuals.

This shows an incredible increase of 130% in the use of visual content in articles published by marketers.

41.5% of marketers said that original graphics, such as infographics and illustrations, were the most effective.

Most marketers, 60.8%, stated that the use of visual content was absolutely necessary to their marketing strategy.

Following that, 31.7% said that visual content was very important for their marketing strategies in 2017, however the amount of budget dedicated to visuals remained relatively low.

The biggest challenge faced by marketers was finding time to produce visuals on a consistent basis.

With video growing in popularity and visuals increasing in importance to get and retain viewer interest, marketers will have to continue to allocate resources to them.

Read the detailed results, complete with infographic templates you can use, on the Venngage blog.

DIGITAL - Social Media: Best Practices for Pet Stores

(World Pet Association / SuperZoo)

World Pet Association has released a whitepaper to help pet businesses with digital marketing.

Social Media: Best Practices for Pet Stores was compiled by Crystal Vilkaitis, social media expert and SuperZoo speaker.

“Social media has become an indispensable tool for retailers and we recognize they’re hungry for information to ensure they’re optimizing their accounts,” WPA President Doug Poindexter said.

“By providing a whitepaper focused on this hot topic, we’re giving retailers access to actionable ways to improve their businesses.”

The content doesn’t just apply to pet stores, all pet businesses can apply the information in the paper.

With a focus on the social selling mindset, created by Crystal Media, the document is packed with best practices - everything from which channels to focus on to the best mix of video, photos and graphics, along with advertising strategy.

Also included is a case study of The Pet Authority, a company who dumped traditional radio ads for social media, resulting in cost savings and increased sales.

Download a copy of the whitepaper from World Pet Association.

DIGITAL - How to Conduct a Social Media Audit

Measuring social media is always a challenge.

A great tool for digital marketers is a social media audit.

A social media audit is the process of reviewing what’s working, what’s failing and what can be improved upon across your social media channels.

When you conduct a social media audit, you collect and analyze data from all of your social media accounts looking closely at your activity, results, audience, and financial investments.

And there are a plenty of tools out there to help you create a social media audit that works for your company or organization.

Hootsuite has a template for an audit so you don’t even have to create the document - just fill in the blanks.

Social Media Examiner recently posted an article about how to conduct an audit that also has information about the value of the results.

The format of Harvard Business Review’s template - which includes who, where, what, when, why and opportunity - provides a clear and simple result that is easy to understand and develop future goals from.

A Sproutsocial blog post has detailed information to help you determine what you want to include in your template, how to determine the best and worst performing channels, and even reminds you to check your branding across all your digital marketing efforts.

While audits take time, they are important to help keep a business on track and meeting organization goals.

They don’t need to be done weekly or even monthly.

Most organizations complete a social media audit quarterly, twice per year or annually.

DIGITAL - Live Video: Tips and Techniques for Creating Great Content

Live video - everybody’s talking about it, everyone says you should do it, and you need to do it well.

Social Media Examiner’s latest podcast features Alex Khan, the founder of Attractive Media, a German social media agency that helps businesses with live video.

Khan says that in only two years, he’s built his audience from nothing to 230,000 followers and 55 million hearts on Periscope, and he shares tips for creating great content.

According to the podcast, Khan believes people watching live video are always interested in five topics:

• Personal stories
• Behind the scenes
• Q&A’s
• Giveaways
• Sneak peeks

And your video doesn’t need to be limited to one topic, you can incorporate more.

The good news he shares is there is no expectation of perfection when you’re live - the medium is appealing because it replicates the way people connect and talk to each other in real life.

Khan shares the best ways to open and end a live stream and when to ask for a share or follow - hint: it’s not at the end - and he goes on to discuss code word strategy, software that adds graphics and animation, and much more.

Listen to the entire podcast of Live Video: Tips and Techniques for Creating Great Content.

FUTURE TRENDS - Tackling Bad Behaviour on Social Media

(netsanity.net)

Online social interaction has been a fraught topic since its earliest days, and although the technology has progressed, the fear remains. So, too, does the promise.

“Stranger danger” has new relevance in the digital age, where users take it as a given that the person on the other end of the keyboard may not be who they say they are.

In addition to the age-old stranger danger trope, online forums are full of cyberbullying, hate speech, and abuse.

But social media offers benefits that often outweigh these risks, and many vulnerable and isolated groups are finding community online.

How can users and providers tip the balance, facilitating more positive and pro-social engagement and discouraging abuse and bullying?

Experts have been weighing in on this issue for years, and many of the suggestions made a few years ago have been tried, without much success.

Ideas, such as the ones listed in this 2013 BBC article, including “add a report abuse button to everything,” “get the police to do it,” and “force people to use their own names” are all strategies that have backfired.  

For example, Facebook’s real name policy has been widely panned for its negative impact on women, abuse victims, and minorities.

Their option to report a violation of community standards has been co-opted by trolls, is differentially enforced, and is frequently used to silence the very people it was meant to protect.

Twitter’s introduction of a report button met significant skepticism, for fear of the same issues cropping up.

And when it comes to having the police handle it, criminalization often won’t work when it comes to abusive speech online.

Dr. Martin Graff, head of research in psychology at the University of South Wales and an expert in online interaction, told Vice, “most of the harassment that people are worried about is not actually illegal, not something you can be jailed for. When words are hurtful, the best solution is to sit people together, and bring some context.”

Adding context is critical.

When Nextdoor found that their neighbourhood social app had a racial profiling problem, they tackled it through design changes that encouraged users to think more carefully about what they were posting.

They saw a 75% reduction in racial profiling posts.

This offers hope for designers of other platforms, also.

Quartz reminds designers that, “There’s no such thing as an unbiased platform. Every digital interaction encourages certain behaviors, and every media channel has limitations. Actively shaping those parameters to encourage civil, factual discussion isn’t only justifiable—it’s nearly an ethical necessity.”

Virtual reality may provide a new frontier for the “active shaping” that Quartz is so optimistic about, by re-humanizing the voice across the digital divide.

There is evidence that people are more civil when speaking face to face, and VR may bring that dynamic back into the digital realm.

But without careful design choices, VR will run into the same issues of rampant misogyny and abuse that other platforms experience, as evidenced by the fact that there have already been reports of sexual harassment in VR spaces.

In 2015 UNESCO released a 60-page report on the topic of countering online hate speech.

Their conclusion? The issue is complex.

The digital environment is not fully understood, and human behaviour online is adapting at a rapid pace.

Awareness, responsiveness, and intentional design are going to have to be part of the solution on the side of providers.  

And for users? Psychology may offer some answers.

Cognitive behavioural training, cognitive bias modification, inhibition training, and empathy training are all strategies that can help prevent abuse and shift the internal motivations that drive abusers to tweet, post, and hashtag with such violence.

Changing the way users think may help cut down on the negative aspects of online interaction, and it may also help more people find meaningful connections with each other.

That potential for connection is one of the true gifts of the digital era.

About Tiffany Sostar

Tiffany is a published academic, an editor with the Editors Association of Canada, an independent scholar and researcher, and a self-care and narrative coach. She is particularly interested in the intersection of technology and identity - how our tools shape our selves and change our stories, and in how the nature of work is changing as we incorporate more technology into our daily lives.

FUTURE TRENDS - Social Media is Changing How we Communicate

Social media is changing the way we communicate, and there are some valid fears about what that means.

But the changes are not all bad, and many isolated or vulnerable communities are finding ways to use social media to overcome their barriers to connection and health.

Aside from the business benefits of social media, including marketing, branding, and networking, social media is also having positive impacts in a range of small communities.

One example of an isolated group using social media effectively can be found in Canada’s First Nations communities.

2014 research published in the Canadian Journal of Communications found that “members of First Nation communities in the Sioux Lookout zone are frequent users of social networking sites” and that social media use “is contributing to social capital, strengthening both bonding and bridging networks within and among the communities, and providing an important avenue for sharing information and stories that support the development and preservation of culture.”

For these users, although issues of hateful comments by anonymous users are still a concern (a concern that is found on social media sites across the web), the benefits of connection, community, and cultural preservation are often worth the risk.

Another example of vulnerable and isolated users finding community online is among the elderly.

Although users in their 80s and 90s faced a learning curve when engaging online, once they started sharing stories and photos, their sense of isolation decreased and they found a valuable outlet for social connection.

This is important, because social isolation among the elderly is linked to significant health risks.

Social media has also been beneficial for autistic individuals seeking community, and for their families.

There are a lot of people online, and a lot of people using new technology to find communities that they couldn’t access when they were limited to the groups within their physical area.

LGBT people, people with chronic or mental illness and, of course, people of colour (and especially women of colour) are finding connection and community through social media.

There is even an organization using social media to connect homeless individuals with their families and mitigate some of the social isolation that can accompany homelessness.

When it comes to youth, the issue is complex.

Young people in Cape Town, South Africa have used social media to challenge stigmas and stereotypes, find volunteer opportunities, and network into careers that they might not have been able to access otherwise.

But many other young people find themselves the targets of vicious cyberbullying, and a recent study found that 73% of middle and high school students had been bullied at school at some point, and 44% had been bullied in the last 30 days.

Girls were more likely to have been bullied, which is not a surprise given what research has already demonstrated about misogyny online.

This highlights the complexity of social media’s impact on communities.

Those groups most in need of connection – the vulnerable, isolated, and marginalized among a population – are also the most likely to face the ugly side of social media.

A recent study on hate speech online is a poignant counterpoint to the benefits found by Canada’s First Nations communities – 48% of hate posts analyzed targeted race.

There’s safety and connection online, but there’s also hate.

Although there is significant good being found, and built, on social media platforms, there is work to be done.

The final article in this series will examine ways forward for social media users and providers.

About Tiffany Sostar

Tiffany is a published academic, an editor with the Editors Association of Canada, an independent scholar and researcher, and a self-care and narrative coach. She is particularly interested in the intersection of technology and identity - how our tools shape our selves and change our stories, and in how the nature of work is changing as we incorporate more technology into our daily lives.

FUTURE TRENDS - Technology and Changing Social Norms, Part 1

The Internet, and the changing nature of communication in the digital age, has sparked what MIT’s Technology Review calls “all manner of utopian and dystopian perceptions that, when examined closely through methodologically rigorous empirical research, turn out not to be accurate.”

The fear associated with changing technology is not new; in fact, Genevieve Bell points out that the same types of fear currently circulating about the destructive power of the Internet and social media also swept through society with the introduction of trains, steam engines, electricity, television, and radio.

Conrad Gessner first wrote about the dangers of information overload in 1545, following the introduction of the printing press.

Since then, and even before then, the introduction of technology, particularly when that technology changes the way we communicate and relate to each other, has met with significant resistance.

Slate points out that even Socrates felt some hand-wringing anxiety that new technology and media, such as writing, would harm children’s minds.

Each generation fears the losses associated with new technology - loss of time spent outdoors, of time spent with physical books, or of whatever else is considered sacrificed on the altar of technology.

But are these fears valid?

The digital age has accelerated the pace of change, and some writers worry that technology is rewiring our brains in ways we can’t always predict and may not want.

It is worth noting that all new technology “rewires our brains” – the effect of reading on brain structure is significant, and videogames have similarly significant effects on brain structure.

Television may not actually “rot your brain,” but, as Scientific American points out, sitting in front of a screen does present significant potential health problems.

Fears about social media may have echoes of earlier technology scares, but there are some real differences.

Social media tends to polarize individuals, and the algorithms that work to keep you within your bubble exacerbate this problem.

The anonymity of the internet can lead to behaviour that is disinhibited and aggressive, and the impact of this “trolling” behaviour has already resulted in multiple instances of real-world violence.

Particularly since social media has become such an important part of politics – used to spread true information and the now-ubiquitous fake news – the idea that social media is making it harder to connect with each other is legitimately fear-inducing.

In a world that feels more violent and less safe, finding community is critical.

Being within a community, one that includes membership, influence, integration and fulfillment of needs, and shared emotional connection, is an important part of the human experience.

Humans are highly social animals, and articles that lament how smartphones are ruining relationships touch on some core vulnerabilities and fears.

But humans are adaptive, and technology moves forward, not backward.

However drastically new technology may impact communication and the sharing of information, adaptation will follow.

Novelists have already begun to adapt, and so has human behaviour in relationships.

The next article in this series will look at how some groups are adapting to new technology, and finding ways to connect across new mediums.

About Tiffany Sostar

Tiffany is a published academic, an editor with the Editors Association of Canada, an independent scholar and researcher, and a self-care and narrative coach. She is particularly interested in the intersection of technology and identity - how our tools shape our selves and change our stories, and in how the nature of work is changing as we incorporate more technology into our daily lives.

DIGITAL - How to Avoid Social Media Marketing Mistakes

It doesn’t matter if you’re a novice at social media or have lots of experience, there’s always more to learn.

The speed at which digital media is growing and evolving makes it particularly challenging.

One way to learn is from your mistakes, but wouldn’t it be great to avoid as many as you can?

Marketo is offering a free webinar - 8 Biggest Mistakes Social Media Marketers Make and How to Avoid Them - on March 15th.

Lisa Marcyes, Sr. Social Media Marketing Manager at Marketo, will be discussing the top eight social media marketing mistakes - from strategy, to content, to metrics - and how you can avoid them.

Sign up for the seminar to learn:

• How to develop a winning social media marketing strategy
• Which social media accounts really matter
• How to identify metrics that indicate success

Another tool available to help keep your social media marketing on track is Simply Measured’s Social Attribution 101: The Beginner’s Guide.

With social attribution, you can prove how much revenue or response is driven by your social campaigns.

Download the guide to learn:

• Which attribution model fits your specific needs
• Why attribution is the answer to proving your Social ROI
• Different challenges with social attribution, and how to overcome them.

DIGITAL - How to Avoid Annoying People on Social Media

According to Sprout Social Q3 2016 Social Index, many brands can be annoying their customers on social media.

Sprout surveyed more than 1,000 Facebook, Twitter and Instagram users to determine what annoys them about brands on social, what drives them to unfollow and which industries are on the right side of the line.

86% of social media users want to and do follow brands on social. But when they do, they’re looking for relevant content.

According to Sprout, one of the biggest mistakes companies make is not providing the content their followers want.

Too many promotions tops the list of annoying social media actions.

This is followed by using slang or jargon, not having personality in the account, trying to be funny when they’re not, and not responding to messages.

Sprout’s suggestions to avoid these mistakes:

“Identify your brand values, collect data, identify audiences and target your content accordingly. Additionally, pull together guidelines that steer clear of over-played phrases and stay true to your brand’s personality.”

Not surprisingly, many of the factors that annoy customers also cause them to unfollow a brand. 

With 57% of people who follow a brand likely to make a purchase from that brand, it’s important to figure out well-balanced social media messaging.

Promotional posts are valid to followers, but not too many. Add to that most people have to see a product or service 2-4 times on social before they purchase it and social marketers’ heads may begin to spin in confusion.

Sprout’s suggestions:

“...you don’t want to bombard your audience with the exact same messaging over and over again. Minimally edit and revise your social post in order to keep your followers attentive and engaged. Change the headline or photo for a blog article you’re posting on Facebook. Link to your website by including a different quote or data point in your Tweet. Try posting the same product photo on Instagram in different settings and environments and make sure to include an updated caption.”

Some of the most annoying industries on social media according to the survey include government, banking/finance, marketing/advertising and real estate.

A few of the most liked industries on social media are retail, media/entertainment, consumer goods and technology.

Some interesting findings in the report are around perception versus reality.

Sprout looked at how brands’ responsiveness was perceived and cross-referenced that with data on how each industry actually responds.

People perceive media and entertainment as the third most responsive industry - but in reality they are the least responsive.

While people perceive utilities as an unresponsive industry, in reality they are the most responsive of all industries.

Sprout’s conclusions:

“Your followers aren’t interested in overtly promotional social content or poorly received puns. They want to be informed through content that’s adjacent to your industry and relevant to their interests. They want to be engaged with, talked to and recognized.”

Read the full report.