Mediaboss Marketing

If you're a social media marketer, two things are almost certain: You spend a lot of time on your mobile phone, and you spend even more time teaching your friends and colleagues how to use the latest apps and features because you're at the forefront of it all.

Social media is constantly evolving. For example, Snapchat's parent company, Snap Inc., unveiled nine huge new features in 2016 alone. This makes marketers beg the ... Read More

Back in October, I wrote a piece on Mediumthat covered the numbers behind some of today's top social media networks.

From usage numbers to engagement statistics, it was incredible to see just how impactful networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram have become. For example, not only is Facebook home to1.23 billiondaily active users on average, but those users come from all over the world -- with 85.2% residing outside of the U.S. and Canada.

LinkedIn is a highly valuable tool to network with like-minded professionals. But here's something we don't talk about as much as we should -- it's also a highly useful marketing platform.

It mightseem a little bit intimidating. You have enough on your plate -- do you really need to be figuring out yet another way to create targeted content? Actually, yes. You have more power at your disposal with LinkedIn than you might realize.

Here at HubSpot, we're not shy about our fondness of Snapchat. Heck, we even devoted an entire day to recruiting via Snapchat. But maybenot everyone is as crazy about the app as we are. Personal feelings aside, it's time to start taking it seriously.

If nothing else, there's something to be said for Snapchat's off-the-charts growth.

Facebook Ads are going to drive more leads for your business in 2017 than any other paid channel. Youll need to have the right strategy and execute with agility and precision, but right now there is a massive Facebook opportunity for inbound marketers. An opportunity that if you take advantage of now, will pay off for years.

Technology changes fast but that doesnt stop us from missing big shifts. This is because they never happen all at once, but every once in awhile you can catch a glimpse of change in motion.

If youre a digital marketer, its hard to imagine a day spent without social media, even before you arrive at your desk for work.

Think about it. We wake up and immediately check our social media accounts before even getting out of bed, read headlines and trending topics during our commute, and tweet our latest blog posts by the time we arrive at the office.

In December 2016, Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg stated that Facebook has evolved from a traditional social media network into a new type of media company -- one that offers a hybridtechnology and news platform where content creators and readers publish, share, and talk about what's happening in the world.

Its the start of another year, which means youre probably back in the office after vacation, hard at work on your New Years resolution. And if youre a marketer, you may also be fine-tuning your strategic plan for success in 2017.

We have a variety of resources for getting your marketing plan organized for the upcoming year -- between the 2017 marketing strategy kit, the social media content calendar, and the blog editorial calendar, weve got your content marketing strategy covered.

Between photos of beautiful dinners created with the help of meal delivery services to videos featuring the "unboxing" of a new mobile phone, people love to share their experiences with brands on social media.

This type of content is known as user-generated content (UGC), which is produced by actual product users through their own publishing and social media platforms.

You might already know that Instagram is a growing channel that lets individuals and businesses alike expand their brand. For businesses especially, it's a way to humanize your brand, recruit future employees, showcase your product and company culture, delight customers, and generate new business.

But here's the deal: Unless you're famous, it's really hard to amass a huge following on Instagram without some hard work.

By now, it's clear that creating great visual content is critical for marketers -- and that's especially true on social media.

It was recently announced that Instagram has doubled its monthly active user base since 2014, which means a lot more people are viewing and sharing photos. Plus, visual content is 40X more likely to get shared on social media than other types. In other words, people like to be shown, not told -- and in turn, they share.

2016 brought change the marketing industry in many ways -- from powerful innovations to continuously evolving mediums.

But digital marketers know that change happens frequently in our industry, and adaptability is key to continue driving results in the face of burgeoning trends, growing social networks, and new, advanced technology.

On December 14th, Twitter announced that users would be able to broadcast live video directly from Twitter on iOS and Android mobile devices. This move is the result of Twitters integration with Periscope, the live video streaming app it acquired back in March of 2015.

Earlier in 2016, Twitter began featuring live and replayed Periscope videos in Twitter timelines that users could watch and interact with -- even without a Periscope account.

A great storyteller once said, brevity is the soul of wit. And although William Shakespeare wasnt alive for the invention of video, we think he would agree with our marketing spin: Brevity is the soul of video content.

Video content has exploded on social media: Videos are watched by 82% of Twitter users, and 100 million hours of video are watched on Facebook every day.

Social media is no longer the new kid on the block when it comes to marketing channels. Todays most successful B2B and B2C companies have recognized and harnessed its potential as a scalable lead generation tool. It's also a great growth engine, driving conversions throughout the funnel.

Whether youre a Baby Boomer or a youngmember of Gen Z, there's a good chance you use some form of social media. In fact, there are over 2 billion social media users worldwide.

When it comes to marketing, segmenting social media content for your audience is key. And one way to target your social media marketing efforts is by age group.

Every year, as soon as Halloween is behind us, it seems like the floodgates open. Without warning, there are holiday marketing campaigns everywhere, with countless businesses rushing to cash in on a spending frenzy. There are holiday emails, social media posts, and TV ads -- oh, my.

It might seem like holiday marketing is out of control. But some brands do it very, very well.

Imagine that youre within 140 characters of connecting with a customer, prospect, or influencer. How can you afford not to reach out?

Were talking Twitter, of course: the 300-million strong whirlpool of information that has emerged as a personal branding, relationship-building nirvana.

One average, Facebook is home to 1.18 billion daily active users -- from CEOs, to students, to companies. And while the community is clearly there, connecting with them from a marketing standpoint isn't always easy.

For brands, posting on Facebook alone isn't enough anymore -- especially for ones just starting out. Sure, you can throw money at your efforts to drive people to your Facebook Page and send them to your website, but that only works if you're smart about it.

One average, Facebook is home to 1.18 billion daily active users-- from CEOs, to students, to companies. And while the community is clearly there, connecting with them from a marketing standpoint isn't always easy.

For brands,posting on Facebook alone isn't enough anymore -- especially for onesjust starting out. Sure, you can throw money at your efforts to drive people to your Facebook Page and send them to your website, but that only works if you're smart about it.

Some of the greatest discoveries of all time came to fruition at the intersection between two ideas. Think about it: Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, pajama jeans, and sporks ... just to name a few.

This week, Instagram proved the power of cross-pollinating ideas once more when it announced the addition of live video on Instagram Stories and disappearing photos and videos in Instagram Direct.

Over the past couple of months, you may have heard some things about Facebook's metrics.

There was talk of numbers -- lots of them. Things were overestimated. Others were underestimated. People were kind of upset. But mostly, they were confused. What the heck happened? How was Facebook going to respond? And at the end of the day, what did it mean for marketers? Breathe, and don't panic -- we're here to answer all of that.

Although Twitter's growth rate has slowed down over the past year, it's still one of the most popular --- and powerful -- social media networks around. It has 313 million active users, 79%of accountsoutside of the United States.

With reach like that, businesses around the world are smart to continue using and innovating on Twitter -- and adapting to the way people use it.

LinkedIn is best known as the world's largest professional network -- in other words, users arent thereto look at cat memes or read celebrity gossip. Instead, they're looking toconnect with people in their industry, network, keep up with industry news, and look potential job opportunities.

For marketers, paying attention to this difference in user purpose is key when building your social strategy.

Its been a year since Twitter polls became an option for users to engage, entertain, and survey their social media audience. And just recently weve found ourselves asking, Are there any brands out there that are really using Twitter Polls well?

In the not-so ancient past, Twitter users used to tweet out makeshift polls and use likes, retweets, or replies to get their results.

Community managementhas become an essential part of a successful long-term social media marketing strategy. In fact, it's turned into more than just a social media strategy: Community management leads to customer retention, and studies have shown thatprofits increase 95% when retention grows over 5%.

It's no mystery that social media is a crucial part of any marketing strategy -- regardless of industry, company size,product, or service.

We've all been there. Back in the day, I had to make thecase for some businesses to even havea social media presence in the first place. Butfinally -- finally! -- it seems like folks are catching on. After all,69% of marketers are using social media to build a following.

Since 2010, Instagram has garnered more than 500 million users, 4.2 billion daily likes, and more than 95 million photos and videos posted per day. Brands who take advantage of this unique social media platform often find that the level of exposure that Instagram gives them is unprecedented.

But creating a successful, branded Instagram account requires more than just pretty images.

What do cross-country road trips, wedding speeches, and social media marketing have in common?

You could wing all three, but it's probably better to have a plan for what direction youre heading -- especially when it comes to your social media content strategy.

Unless you're a celebrity or a household name brand, it's really difficultto build a substantial following on Twitter. Maybe you've made it to a couple thousand followers but can't seem to bump it up any more.

Frustrating, isn't it?

What makes you click on ads? Is it the cute picture of a puppy, the funny caption, or are you only motivated by a great deal?

While there are plenty of studiesand articlesthat allude to what makes social media advertising successful, ad performance depends largely on your ability to create ad content that feels natural or organic (aka native advertising).

Social media is an extremely valuable tool for promoting your marketing content.

But with so many social networks providing their own individual content sharing and follow buttons, it's often difficult to know which social media button to use for what purpose.

At a conference in June, a Facebook VP said that in five years time the platform would be "all video."That's a bold statement, but it's not unbelievableif you've scrolled through your News Feed lately.

And one of the biggest drivers behind the growing prevalence of videois Facebook Live, which only was introduced in April of this year, but has since become a major distribution channel for both publishers and brands.

For a while now, it's been clear that Instagram isn't just a social network for selfies and brunch pics. In fact, Instagram sees a whopping 500 million users -- a 25% increase in audience size over less than a year.

In a world where visual content remains a crucial part of any business' marketing strategy, Instagram presents a unique opportunity to visually represent your brand, celebrate its personality, and keep it top-of-mind for all those users who scroll through their Instagram feeds every single day.

These days, teams of all shapes and sizes -- from NASA to charity: water --are using the real-time messaging app Slack as a tool for communication and collaboration.

Over the past few years, it's become a robust platform thanks to all of the fun and useful integrations folks have built on top of it.Nowadays, there's a whole lot of really cool stuff you can do in Slack, from polling your teammates, to tracking bugs, to adding GIFs to yourconversations.

The last time I went on vacation, Facebook and Instagram announced two big product changes that I was left scrambling to catch up on when I returned.

Know the feeling? If you work in social media marketing, my guess is you know it all too well.

Social media is constantly evolving, making today an exciting time to work in marketing.

Before the days of smartphones -- if you can remember such a time -- taking a great photo was a labor-intensive process. You'd have buy a fancy camera and editing software for your desktop computer, and invest some serious time and energy into learning how to use them.

But thanks to our mobile devices and the editing apps that come with them, we can now take high quality photos and edit them without too many bells and whistles -- all from the same device that we use to make calls.

Video has been on the rise for a while, offering marketers a proven way to grab strangers' attention and keep their target audience engaged.

Live video streaming in particular has become increasingly popular as a tool for companies and groups to connect directly with their users, to gain greater product awareness, and to brand themselves creatively.

Visual content garners a huge amount of engagement on social media. There's a reason why71% of online marketers use visual assets in their social media marketing: People respond to it.

Being able to share this content across multiple platforms, then, is an asset. And one of the best ways to do that is tolink Instagram to Facebook -- that increases the number of eyes on your visual content.

Raise your hand if youd rather watch a video to learn something new than read about it.

Go ahead -- youre not alone. 59% of executives say theyd rather watch a video than read text, too.And really, that number makes sense -- we are a society of video streamers. (I mean, hello, Netflix.)

When people talk about today's most popular social sharing websites, YouTube often gets left out of the conversation in favor of sites like Facebook and Twitter.

But don't be fooled:YouTube has a lot going for it. Although Facebook might be the largest social networking site, YouTube has the second greatest reach after Facebook in terms of general usage. It's alsothe second biggest search engine behind its parent company, Google.

With the average attention span dipping to just 8.25 seconds -- as short as that of a goldfish-- today's marketers are tasked with creating content that's engaging enough to appeal to distracted consumers.

With that in mind, Snapchat -- a real-time messaging and multimedia app -- has become an increasingly attractive channel for those looking to engage the 18-34 year old demographic and grow their brand's social media presence.

With 1.13 billion daily active users engaging on the platform, Facebook has become an obvious option for marketers looking to explore the benefits of targeted ad creation.

And while Facebook's targeting options make it easier for you to get your ads in front of the people you really care about, it's ultimately up to you to do the convincing. To do that, you'll need to pay close attention to the details.

Despite its impressive reach --over 300 million daily active users and counting -- it took some time for marketers to realize the business potential of Instagram.

Not only isincluding Instagram in your social media marketing strategyhelpful in terms of achievinghigh levels of engagement and brand awareness, but it can also make it easier for you to attract new leads and customers.

Most marketers know by now that Facebook is an important business tool for companies of every size and industry. With adaily active user base of1.13 billion (1.03 billion on mobile alone), youknow itcan help you reach new audiences you may not have been able to reach otherwise. It can also help you get found more easily in search, create a community around your business, promote the content you create, anddevelop a strong brand identity.

Back when I was in business school, just a wee lass interning for a consulting firm, one of my first assignments was to deliver a presentation on the value of social media. I had to prove why something like Twitter was actually of any use in this industry, and explain how we would leverage it to promote our company.

At the time, it was a bit of a tall order.

On Tuesday, Instagram introduced Instagram Stories, a new feature with remarkable similarities to Snapchat.

Stories provides Instagram users with a place to share posts at a higher frequency. While Instagram photos are typically reserved for perfectly composed shots, Stories allows you to share the little moments that may not be as picture-perfect.

Your headshot is kind of like the logo for your personal brand.

Like a business logo, it'll show up everywhere you showcase your personal brand online: your Twitterprofile, your LikedIn profile, your blog,your email signatures, and so on.And, also like a business logo,it'sa great opportunity for youto use imagery to make a lasting, positive impression on your audience.

Over the past few years, video has become one of the most compelling ways for brands to tell their stories on social media.

From the instant popularity of Facebook Live videos toInstagram increasing their video length from 30 to 60 seconds, marketers are using the power of video to communicate their business' personalities and brand stories, to express creativity, and to build emotional connections with fans and followers.

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