I recently had the honor of speaking on a “Marketing Makeover” panel at @TLMI printTHINK in Rosemont, Illinois on the ways that social media can make an impact in the label and packaging space. Social media has been and remains a hot topic for our industry as converters and suppliers alike struggle with its value vs concerns of sharing too much intel. I fielded a lot of great questions at the conference – so we thought we would share some of the content more broadly via this blog.
A few of our core LPC beliefs:
- Social media is a function of marketing – a means to connect with customers on a regular basis
- Social media has moved from “should have” to “must have” reality in our industry
- As with all industries, we’re experiencing a significant impact of the next generation of customers/employees and our businesses need to be ready for millennials and Gen Zers who live and breathe social media.
- Average tenure of customers is decreasing and converters need to find ways to keep communicating with brand sourcing personnel – who are now in place for an average of only 14 months
- Prospects are prospects – good content and imagery is equally important at the office as it is when they’re home browsing b2c channels.
- We’re particularly bullish on these three channels for label and packaging content: LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.
Although given enough time, we could have gone on for hours on tips and tricks – we honed in on the top eight ways to use social media to drive traffic:
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- Don’t think of social media in isolation. Integrate it with your content marketing, press releases, enewsletters. And don’t start it if you can’t keep it up.
- You really do have a lot of good stories to tell! Think about product launches, trade show activities, new staff, new installations, customer feedback, community activities. The well is deep – and it’s always best to feature a real person from your company, customers or partners. Be sure to take the time to find an interesting angle and humanize your brand.
- We live in a world of design. Especially if you’re communicating with brands! Use intriguing graphics to pull folks into your story. Think about creating a consistent look and feel across your social media channels.
- Know your company’s voice. Be sure to figure this one out before you start. Are you serious? flippant? edgy? humble? This is especially important if your parent company is on a different continent – you may want to modify the language to fit your own customers/prospects/employees.
- Your phone shoots video. Video ALWAYS wins the day and generates higher interest and engagement. And it doesn’t have to be super professional with a huge budget. In fact, shot well with a smart phone your “amateur” photo can send a message of authenticity. There are lots of great tutorials online.
- You’ve already hired your best brand ambassadors. Extend your reach by making sure your internal team is liking/sharing/commenting on all your posts. At a minimum, train your sales team to be fluent on LinkedIn.
- Begin with a contact acquisition plan. “Build it and they will come” only works in the movies. Be sure to think about how to continuously get your customers, OEMs, and partners to follow and share your activity.
- Think carefully about who’s posting on your behalf. Do you really want to entrust your brand to a high school intern? Far too often, social media falls to the bottom of the food chain – if you don’t have internal resources, hire the right person to write and manage your accounts, and be sure they are well versed in your business and our industry.
Have any more questions on the ways that social media can help you grow your business?
Reach out to us here. We love talking about all things social and traditional media.