Advertising on Social Media - Get It or Forget It

I’m a “tweeter” for offers that I think will be of interest to my followers. Not expecting to become a millionaire with it, but did it to get an up close perspective on this new social media advertising frontier.

When a sponsorship offer is received by a tweeter like me, the offer, link to the target website, and a short description of the offer are provided. Tweeters are then asked to write their own tweet about it, including necessary links and disclosures. Pretty straightforward.

Just one issue: Sometimes it is a little difficult to decipher exactly what the advertiser wants to say. I have advanced college degrees. So my ability to read and write is pretty good. But I had one advertiser who rejected my tweet three times, indicating it wasn’t correct. Hmm…

Looking at the situation again, I noticed that the advertiser was asking for multiple hashtags (keyword search word preceded by the symbol “#”) plus their Twitter handle. That’s a lot of real estate for a 140 character space. Then the offer description was written in a way that it was difficult to know if it was directed at the tweeter or the target audience. Also noticed that I had several times the followers as the advertiser. Were they new to Twitter? I’m thinking that may have been the case.

The situation made me think about some things that advertisers need to consider before trying to launch campaigns on social media networks:

Understand the Limitations – In my example, the advertiser must have heard that hashtags were important. However, requiring extensive use of these character-stealing elements made it difficult for tweeters to say anything useful in the remaining space. Know what you have to work with.
Understand the Nuances – Twitter is fast and is a constantly flowing information “ticker.” As such, advertising must tell a story in one or two sentences tops. Facebook ads allow for pictures. But with the flood of visual and text content filling each page, the photo must be attention-getting. Social media ads are not just scaled-down versions of website banners! Ads must be specifically developed for each platform.
Understand the Communication Styles – Additionally, the communication styles vary from network to network. Twitter and Facebook lean toward the casual. LinkedIn is more formal and less chatty. Violate the styles and you’ll turn people off, demonstrating that you are not “one of us.” Social media is all about belonging and trust. It’s a good idea to become a member of the network to learn how your target audience behaves within it, adjusting your strategy accordingly.

Bottom line is you must “get” the social media platform on which you are advertising. Otherwise, forget it since you will only alienate your target audience.

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