No longer just a fun and easy way to communicate, share and stay connected with friends, social media has grown to become an important platform for companies to reach new followers and build brand reputation. As a brand, being “good” at social media is challenging. If you want to maximize engagement, you must understand your audience and tailor your message appropriately. You’re not alone if you are struggling to establish your social media voice. The list of big-name brands that still use mundane, unengaging, or over-the-top content in their social media marketing is long. There are also many companies that have spent the necessary time and resources to create a unique social media strategy that keeps their brand relevant by speaking directly to their audience. Below are a few top brands on social media and both what they’re doing to master social media and what you can do too.
National Geographic
National Geographic wants to be part of the conversation with the widest audience possible. They do this by creating timely, memorable, and important stories for not only their magazine and website but for each of their social media platforms as well. Over the past two years in the United States, National Geographic has ranked number one among brands on social media with more than 2.6 billion social engagements. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat are their largest social media platforms. Content on each platform is customized to meet the unique expectations and desires of each site’s users. For example, their main Instagram account – @NatGeo – is run by their photographers and takes nearly 67 million followers on virtual journeys around the world allowing people to experience the world as seen through the eyes of the photographer. In the future, 360-degree video and virtual reality will offer users fully immersive experiences. Their commitment to their audience on all platforms will ensure that they continue to see great success with social media.
Netflix
When it comes to social media, Netflix has but one goal, “to be entertainment’s biggest fan.” Netflix received multiple nominees and was the winner of “The Best in Social Media” in Creative Use of Technology by The Shorty Awards. Netflix understands who their social audience is and regularly posts relevant content on each of their social media platforms. With more than 23 million fans, Facebook is their leading social media network. Geo-targeting on Facebook helps them to split their content into regions to ensure that the most relevant information gets to the targeted audience. All posts are either videos and gifs with an occasional image. Their US Twitter account has more than 2 million followers. New posts are added a few times a day with a lot of retweeting. Instagram has 1.7 million followers and posts content 2-4 times a week. Posts are similar to Facebook including high-quality images and videos related to recently streaming episodes and shows.
Netflix has an excellent handle on social media and does a great job of interacting with and entertaining their target audience on each social platform that gets them fantastic results.
SpaceX
While manufacturing usually isn’t viewed as exciting and noteworthy, SpaceX doesn’t let that stigma hinder its social media strategy. By using social media to convey the drama of a rocket launch through live feeds and regular updates on the progress of their rocket technology, SpaceX is directly engaging with a new generation. Live feeds of launches are viewed and shared by thousands of followers on Facebook while Twitter followers can follow tweets directly from the founder of SpaceX, Elon Musk. This allows for a more personal interaction between users while boosting brand recognition in the process.
PreFlight Airport Parking
When we talk about parking, more often than not, we are complaining about a lack of it, or about the cost. Especially in larger cities and airports. With the ever-increasing cost of traveling, saving money where possible is a must. Parking at airports is quite expensive and, depending on the length of your trip, the cost adds up quickly. PreFlight Airport Parking is one of the largest near-airport parking providers in the United States, with facilities at seven of the largest airports.
PreFlight uses social media as a way to engage with customers and build loyalty. Each PreFlight location has profiles on Facebook, Twitter and Google+, where they regularly post travel-related content. Core content themes cover travel tips, airport info (location specific), links to check TSA wait times, flight status/departure times, airport guides, facility news and pricing specials. Customers regularly share their parking experience at PreFlight by posting reviews on Facebook, Google and Yelp. Over the past 6 months, PreFlight has an average rating of 4.29 (out of 5) stars on Google! Earlier this year, PreFlight used Facebook to promote their locations by offering a free week of parking to a random Facebook follower. The idea was to increase page interaction and increase followers to their location profiles. It was very successful, with each location page receiving dramatic increases in engagement during the week of the promotion.
PreFlight’s smart and consistent use of social media has paid off for them as they have grown their brand, increased traffic to their site and attracted new customers.
The importance of social media marketing can’t be denied. When done properly, it can lead to an increase in customers, more traffic to your site, a higher conversion rate and increased revenue. Social media isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, and you can be sure that your competitors are already involved. So whether you need to start your social media strategy or revamp your current strategy, it’s not too late to increase the reach of your business and reap the benefits.