Campaigns in social media should be thought of as long-term strategies, not as fire-and-forget impression and branding initiatives. The most successful social media campaigns are those than run over a period of months or years, not just two-day roadblocks designed to get the word out and raise awareness.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with short-term branding programs, it’s simply that it’s not an effective use of funds. Traditional media types (tv, radio, print, etc) only allowed for this type of campaign – one couldn’t build a relationship, or even reappear in front of consumers without continued purchase of media. In social media however, a media buy can lead to a brand page, and on that page one can gather fans or friends. In fact, we often see friend/fan conversion rates as high as 30% from ad click-throughs. By establishing this relationship a brand has a direct channel to brand advocates, and it’s an utter waste not to utilize this channel over time.
Put another way, one can think about the branding/impression cycle numerically.
Initial media buy: $500,000
eCPM: $5
Initial cold impressions: 100,000,000
Ad click-through: .05%
Page visitors: 50,000
Resulting page fans/friends: 15,000
Status updates / messages to fans per year: 100
Additional brand impressions among brand advocates: 1,500,000
How much would you pay for enough traditional media to get in front of brand advocates twice a week for a year? In social media, it’s free.
