Spotify becomes more App-ealing

December 1, 2011

At it’s first-ever U.S. press conference yesterday, Spotify unveiled their new app platform, which they hope will be the next big step in social music.

The platform allows third-party developers to use the streaming service’s music library and community to create personalised and tailored services for their users. Initially the Spotify Platform is only launching with a dozen apps but more are expected to appear shortly.

Spotify have so far confirmed they have partnered with the likes of Rolling Stone, Last.fm, Billboard, Songkick and The Guardian, as the online music service aims to build on its current offering and enhance the user experience.

An app launching its own app platform is a fascinating move and also an exciting one – it should allow companies and services to use Spotify in new and inventive ways.

For music publications such as Rolling Stone and Billboard, apps offer a way to allow users to read a review while silmultaneously listening to the album. However there are even more exciting and compelling ways that services can use Spotify. Let’s take the example of the Last.fm app within Spotify.

Last.Fm

Last.fm is the world’s largest online music catalogue, powered by your scrobble. Spotify has long allowed users to integrate their Spotify listening to their Last.fm accounts. Now, the integration is bolstered with customised playlists. The new Last.fm app allows users to generate related song playlists based on the track they are currently listening to – by clicking “Similar Tracks Playlist,” Last.fm will generate a playlist of similar tracks of music available to listen to or subscribe to within Spotify and suggestions for users.

That’s not all – the “Now Playing” section of the Last.fm app allows users to get more information about a track or band.

The future of social music?

Having launched in America, begun its subscription model and formed a partnership with Facebook it has been a busy year for Spotify. These new apps will help to continue to build the brand and add a new and exciting dimension to Spotify’s user experience.

How to Use Content to Gain Social Media Success

November 29, 2011

The last year has seen the rise of ‘social’ within search. The huge growth of social media, together with search engines now increasingly focussing on providing the best possible user experience, has resulted in a greater prominence being given to social platforms when search engines return results.

Google, Yahoo and Bing now index social comments and use this information to tailor and personalise users’ search results. Google’s ‘+1’ button now has a large impact on page rank, while Bing has partnered with Facebook to display data from the Facebook ‘Like’ button as well as users’ profiles.

One of the most important effects of this shift towards social is the impact content now has on improving your brand’s online visibility. The phrase being constantly repeated is that ‘content is king’.

Brands therefore need to devise a highly effective social media content plan that takes into consideration the importance of search optimisation. This means creating fresh content which is optimised with relevant keywords and encourages people to share, retweet and engage with it across the social web.

Yet, competition is fierce. There are 27 million pieces of online content shared daily and 1 in 5 social media messages include links to content on the web.

So, as a brand, how do you stand out? With SEO success focusing increasingly on a brand’s social presence it is not enough to just ‘have’ content.

Your content needs to provide something unique and valuable to your audience. Ask yourself: does it convey your brand accurately and provide value to your audience?

The aim is to create active content so that your audience are participating and interacting. Onsite this could be encouraging them to comment on posts and rate articles, while offsite you need to maximise the number of social reactions, such as Facebook ‘Likes’ and tweets.

Here are my recommendations on key considerations when creating content:

WHERE you say it

Social media offers a range of tools that will provide unique insights which allow you to understand your audience. It’s vital you use these tools to research, monitor, understand your audience and make sure that you are where your audience are and using the most relevant and effective platforms.

Your social media content plan should reflect this. It also needs to be continuous and flexible as well as multi-channel. Brands must leverage a range of relevant channels. Twitter and Facebook seem the obvious choices but there are several channels that will help boost your SEO – these could include blogs, LinkedIn, Q&As, podcasts as well as virtual events. Also consider creating a presence on video sites, photo sites, social bookmarking sites and review sites. These will all help to boost the amount of ‘high quality’ content you have and boost your search optimisation.

WHAT you have to say

When creating content, think about the user’s online journey – how will they find your content? This is where search engine optimisation is vital. With the rise of social search, investing in original, quality content is essential to your SEO success.

Google itself has stated that their algorithms are aimed at helping users easily find high quality content. The launch this year of Google Panda, a major upgrade of their ranking algorithm, has resulted in what can be seen as a transformation in search optimisation.

Preference is now given to websites that publish high quality, original content on an ongoing basis. There is also a new focus on social mentions so that the more times people retweet, +1, ‘Like’ or share your online content the higher it ranks.

It means that brands must have a strategy in place for creating regular, relevant and optimised new content as well as growing and engaging your presence on social media networks.

Keywords, meta-tags, alt tags, anchor tags, page titles and heading structures all need to be optimised with the keywords that are most relevant for your brand. It is also vital to be aware of what your competitors are doing and what keywords they rank for and bid on. Putting in place an effective content marketing strategy that is fully optimised and continually updated will have a significant effect on your ranking position on search engines.

However, remember that optimisation of your content shouldn’t be to the detriment of the quality of the user experience or how compelling the content is – it needs to be both optimised so that search engines will find it and compelling enough that your audience will read and share it.

HOW OFTEN you say it

It’s often said that the secret to social media is timing. This means that you must schedule your social media activity and make sure you post at the optimum times for your audience.

Brands often ask how frequently they should post on their Facebook Page and when is the best time to post. The answer is that each campaign and brand is different. As a rule of thumb early mornings as the working day commences, lunchtimes and early evenings straight after work provide the most engagement. Facebook’s Insights data provide an invaluable understanding of how often and when your fans are engaging with your content – and help to ensure that you connect with your audience at the optimum times. Posting at these peak times will have an impact on the viralability of your content, with people more likely to connect with it and share it.

When it comes to frequency there is a delicate balance to be found: post too often and, though you will see an immediate increase in impressions, you will also see a loss in fan numbers. Post too infrequently and you will miss out on opportunities to reach your fans. In general, tweeting 1 – 4 times per hour and posting at least once a day on Facebook will provide the best results.

HOW you say it

As a brand you will have a tone of voice that permeates your organisation. When you create a social media content plan you need to consistently communicate this tone of voice across all platforms.

There are several fundamental factors and ideas that you should focus on when creating your content plan: use your brand narrative to tell a story through social channels. And present this story in a fresh and interesting way by using a range of media – videos, polls, photos as well as text.

One of the most important things, and one that many brands often seem to forget, is that social media is about having conversations. Be engaging, start conversations with your audience and build a real community – this will make your audience much more receptive to your brand and more likely to share and comment upon the content that you are posting.

You must use your content to associate your brand with specific topics and segments that are relevant to your brand and will position you as the experts within your field. It must also be entertaining, informative, and deliver some quantifiable value such as exclusive deals or products.

Quality AND quantity

The rise in the importance of social media to search requires brands to devise a content strategy that provides both quality AND quantity. The real time nature of social media means that content has to be posted frequently in order to stay ahead of your competitors. However, if you want to really stand out your content must also be compelling enough for your audience to engage with it.

Creating optimised content that is tailored both for your audience and for search engines will result in conversations, sharing and high visibility on search engines – in other words, social media success for your brand.

Facebook rolls out new metrics for Pages

October 13, 2011

Facebook has recently released a new set of tools in order to give marketers deeper insights into how well their Pages are engaging and reaching Facebook users. Facebook have promised that these new analytics will help page owners better understand engagement on their brand pages – and, ultimately, make those Pages more useful to brands.

The Facebook Page Insights tool has now been expanded to provide marketers with additional information about their audience. Now, not only will marketers be able to understand the number and ‘Likes’ and impressions on their Page, but they will also be provided with more detailed information such as Friends of Fans, which is designed to show the maximum reach, and Weekly Total Reach, which combines the total exposure to the brand, either via paid or non-paid activity. Most interestingly to brands could be the ‘People Talking About This’ metric which is designed to show conversations happening about a brand across Facebook.

Are ‘People Talking About’ your brand?

The ‘People Are Talking About This’ metric will perhaps prove the most appealing to brands. This metric is based on the total numbers of ‘Likes’, shares and comments relating to a Page during the previous 7 days.

It takes information including the number of people ‘Liking’ your Page; the volume of people ‘Liking’, commenting on, or sharing, the content you have posted on your wall/Page and how many users answered a question you posted, who have RSVP to your events or checked in at your location.

The most important thing to note about this metric is that it is not only visible to the administrators of the Page – it is also visible to page visitors as a public facing metric.

The number appears on the left hand side of the page under the total number of ‘Likes’ and is calculated through an algorithm which analyses ‘Likes’, comments, shares and other Facebook actions to do with your Page. The aim is to help your fans understand how engaging a Page is, in a way, giving Facebook users a transparent version of Facebook’s EdgeRank algorithm.

It’s all about engagement

These tools and metrics reflect the company’s increasing emphasis on the value of ‘sharing’ and the weight Facebook place on engagement between brands and users. Facebook mark a continuation of their growing belief that the amount people share on Facebook and how much they engage with a brand Page as a stronger indication of the value of the Page than simply the total number of users.

These new metrics will force brands to develop a truly effective engagement strategy in order to leverage the power of sharing and use peer recommendations as a brand marketing tool. Pages have never been just about the number of ‘Likes’ and this metric helps to further reinforce this idea.

By focusing on engaging with your target audience rather than just on volume the end result will be a win-win situation for both brands and users. Users will see the quality and value of Facebook Pages improve, while brands will, ultimately, have a more engaged Facebook community who feel an affinity with the brand.

What the Facebook changes mean for brands

September 23, 2011

F8 has now happened. It was an event that was heralded as one that would ‘change the world of social media’ – and that has proved to be true. The Facebook that we know and love has been transformed – with big changes gradually being rolled out. Here we explore how these changes will affect brands:

Facebook becomes an entertainment hub

Facebook’s motto for the F8 conference was ‘Read. Watch. Listen’ – and that neatly sums up the changes that have been made. They have unveiled extensive changes to the social network  – including key tie-ups with companies such as Spotify, Netflix, Zynga (who made Farmville) and The Guardian to create a new breed of apps, including video, music, films, and TV apps.

Facebook has now become an entertainment hub allowing users to watch films, listen to music and read newspaper articles via an app without ever leaving the social platform.

Maximising engagement through social apps

It is clear that what all these new features are attempting to do is make it as easy as possible for users to spend long periods of time on Facebook. They are doing this by lowering the barriers to connecting with friends and family and delivering more tailored and rich media content.

To this end, Facebook have introduced a ‘Ticker feed’ which shows all updates in real time at the top right hand corner of your newsfeed page.  They also announced a completely redesigned profile page, tagged ‘The Timeline’.

The Timeline

Zuckerberg introduced the new ‘Timeline’ feature which will enable users to give a ‘more complete story’ of who they are. This Timeline is an online scrapbook which he said will “help you tell the story of your life”.

The Timeline presents a stream of information about you.  You are, in effect, creating a profile of ‘who you are’ through the photos you’ve posted, all your status updates and the apps you’ve used. Split into multiple columns, the timeline shows all of your updates in one place on an endlessly scrolling page.

Timeline is currently in beta (you probably don’t want to access it straight away unless you’re a developer as it is currently experiencing bugging issues) and will be opt-in to start. However, it will soon become the new default profile page for all users.

How this is good news for brands – a new class of apps

Zuckerberg also explained that Facebook was focusing on making a ‘new class of Open Graph applications’. These apps mean that users can access content such as music and newspaper articles directly within Facebook and let users share what they listen to, watch and read with friends.

This is great news for brands. Based on the ‘Like’ social plug-in developers can now customise ways of sharing their content with new created ‘Listened’, ‘Watched’, and ‘Read’ buttons which will see content posted in users’ timelines or the newly developed live ‘ticker’ stream. So a user’s friends will see the latest music their friends are listening to on Spotify for example, or the film they’ve just watched on Netflix.

The result is that brands have gained an important new way to target Facebook users through advertising. So, by utilising these new buttons – which tells advertisers what musicians, films or publications not only a user likes but also what their friends like – advertisers are being given even more insights into the make-up of their audience. So advertisers on Facebook’s Ads API or those who work with Facebook’s Sales team will be able to reach relevant consumers who might not have directly Liked a Page.

To give an example, rather than just targeting a user who has Liked Lady Gaga’s Facebook Page, brands will be able to target anyone who shared one of her songs through Spotify or any of their friends who clicked ‘Listened’ on a story about her.

These changes will also have an impact on Facebook’s Sponsored Stories ad format. Marketers will now be able to target Sponsored Stories to people based on the content they have shared from apps, such as Netflix or Spotify.

The potential for this type of granular targeting is huge for brands. Though at launch, it is only music, video and readable content that will feature these new feedback buttons, David Fischer, Facebook’s VP of global marketing solutions, told All Facebook  that the site is considering releasing more, including a ‘Want’ button for products. This will provide unique opportunities to more and more industries, such as ecommerce, with shopping brands gaining ‘Wants’ on new products they can promote on Facebook.

Brands need to be more engaging than ever

Facebook also introduced a new ‘lightweight’ sharing feature, in order to give its users the ability to share more things without cluttering their friends’ newsfeeds.  This means that all ‘lightweight’ information will be shown on the Ticker feed only. So status updates, photos and posted links to articles will be shown on the newsfeed, while Likes or your score on the latest game will be shown on the Ticker feed in real time.

This is to ensure that your newsfeed contains only the most valuable and relevant content. For brands this means that they must have a robust and effective strategy in place to deliver compelling content that will engage fans and optimises how much they interact with you.

The changes announced at F8 provide a challenge to brands – but also opportunities. They must create truly compelling content that fans want to engage with. This is all about increasing your Facebook EdgeRank – in the face of these new updates it will be vital to alter and optimise engagement strategies and ensure your brand is one that fans want to see in their newsfeeds.

Cleaning up after the riots using social media

August 9, 2011

If there was ever any sign of the importance of social media as a form of communication then the riots in London and other cities such as Birmingham and Liverpool have provided it.

Social media is a neutral tool – and though it has been used by the minority to instigate violence it has also been shown to be an incredible way to share up-to-date news, a way to offer support and now, today, as a way for communities to join together and start the clean-up operation after the last few nights of destruction.

The ways in which social platforms like Twitter and Facebook allow messages to be quickly shared between large groups in real time and for instant communication to happen, have been invaluable to cleanup organisers who need to quickly and efficiently gather together followers in the aftermath of the rioting.

On Twitter people attending the clean up sessions are using the hashtags #londoncleanup and #riotcleanup to organise themselves. A Twitter account RiotCleanUp was set up last night providing a vital source of information for people looking to help rebuild city centres. The account tweeted places and times where community clear-ups were happening and also posted offers of help and resources. The @RiotCleanUp account has already gained more than 55,000 followers in less than 14 hours.

It quickly gained the attention of celebrities such as Rio Ferdinand, Simon Pegg and Tinchy Stryder  who tweeted about it. TV presenter Clare Balding wrote: “I’ve been trying to find some ray of sunshine amid the chaos, anger & violence. @riotcleanup can allow Londoners to show our real character.” Comedian Dave Gorman commented: “Went to bed depressed by the news. Now feeling strangely emotional as I read about @riotcleanup #riotcleanup Amazing.”

It wasn’t just Twitter that was being used to mobilise communities. One Facebook group called “post riot clean-up: let’s help London” had gained more than 7,000 followers at the time of writing with people offering help and posting about how people can donate to charities who are supporting those affected.

Other platforms have also been used to help people know what is going on. With many rumours about what has happened within London this Google My Map attempts to map verified locations that have been affected by the London rioting and looting.

You can also check out this London Riots Clean Up Storify created by Mashable to see how the story is unfolding.

 

Further tips for improving your Facebook EdgeRank

August 5, 2011

In May we wrote a post on how to improve your brand’s Facebook EdgeRank (You can read that here). However, with many brands still unsure of what exactly it is and how vital it can be we have now outlined additional top tips to boost your Facebook EdgeRank.

There are now more than 750 million Facebook users. 50% of these users log on to Facebook on any given day and the average user has 130 friends. These statistics mean that it’s becoming increasingly difficult for friends and brands to gain a place on users’ News Feeds.

Optimising your Facebook EdgeRank – the unique algorithm which decides what posts appear in your Fans’ ‘Top News’ stream – is therefore becoming increasingly vital.

This algorithm ranks posts based on three main factors: affinity, weight and timing. The higher your ranking for these factors, the more likely your posts will be visible on a Fan’s ‘Top News’ feed.

Though there is no way to officially identify your EdgeRank score, using Facebook’s Insights tool is vital in gaining an understanding of how you are doing and how well you are interacting with your Fans. Insights can tell you how many active monthly users you have in relation to your overall likes. This will give you a clear indication of how high your EdgeRank is.

To put it simply, EdgeRank is all about engagement. EdgeRank is weighted so activities that require higher levels of user engagement get a higher score than those activities that don’t. For example you may want to consider asking an open ended question. This means the higher your engagement level with Fans, the higher your EdgeRank score will be.

Here are our Dos (and a Don’t) on how to increase engagement within Facebook and boost your EdgeRank:

DO:

Run a poll or competition

A good competition or poll not only drives interest in your Page but also increases engagement. They’re fun and actively ask users to interact with your content, increasing the number of ‘edges’ it receives. By building up excitement as the competition comes to a climax you can really build an engaged and receptive audience who are incentivised to interact with you.

Post videos

In our previous post on EdgeRank we recommended using rich media to stand out from your competition – but it’s a point that bears repeating. Videos rank highly compared to other ‘objects’ such as status updates. Not only this, when done correctly they are also easy to digest for the audience, are eye-catching on the page and can succinctly get your message across in an entertaining way. If you create your own videos this is a great opportunity to leverage already existing content you have on YouTube.

Ask questions

Another great tip is to phrase your Facebook post as a question. People generally won’t respond unless they are invited to, so this is a highly effective way of increasing engagement on your Facebook Wall. Social media is about conversations after all! What’s more, ask them questions that are brand relevant and you can gain insights into how your brand can better meet your audience’s needs.

Use links to share content

Social media is all about sharing. Posting links to interesting and relevant content produces a thumbnail for your post (helping it to standout) and also encourages people to click and share the information. You can use this to your brands advantage by driving traffic back to your site or social presences such as Twitter or Flickr for example.  There is also another benefit – creating links that direct to your other sites optimises your brand for search, meaning that it is easier for your audience to find you. This approach of sharing links not only helps with EdgeRank but also boosts SEO to increase your visibility amongst fans and non-fans.

Engage with your fans

It’s important to remember that when you Post it doesn’t mean your work is done. If someone responds to your Post take the opportunity to engage them in conversation. (This must be done in a timely manner and you should only respond if you can add value). This helps to build up a relationship and shows them that they are a valued member of your community. It’s also a virtuous circle as it will encourage more people to engage with your Page – in turn increasing your EdgeRank.

And finally

DON’T:

Autopost

Using tools like HootSuite and TweetDeck might seem efficient but it’s important to remember that, when it comes to EdgeRank, manual posts have more weight than posts automated through apps.

Your audience can tell which posts are automated or have been specifically written for Twitter (e.g. featuring hashtags) and which have been personalised – and for this reason autoposts do not produce as much engagement. Autoposts also have a tendency to disappear from your Fans’ News Feeds more quickly.

Why should you care about EdgeRank?

Optimising your EdgeRank means that your brand is found on your audience’s News Feed – and you are part of an exclusive and trusted club. You are able to talk to your audience every day, build greater engagement and you are ideally positioned to create deep, meaningful and long-lasting relationships with them. Understanding the benefits of Facebook EdgeRank and implementing our strategic insights can help create an engaged community, gain a trusted and receptive customer base and, ultimately, maximise your ROI.

How to monetise your Facebook presence

August 2, 2011

Social networks are becoming increasingly business minded. Facebook has always been a platform that has been aware of the commercial possibilities that it offers – and throughout the last year it has added features that show an understanding of the needs and interests of brands across industries.

The emergence of Facebook DealsFacebook Credits and Facebook Commerce are all evidence of the platform’s willingness to offer brands opportunities to monetise their presence on Facebook:

Facebook Deals The launch of Facebook Deals is part of a growing trend where consumers increasingly use their mobiles instead of credit cards. It lets users ‘check in’ to venues via the Places feature on the Facebook mobile app. For example, through Deals, the first 30,000 Facebook users to check in at Starbucks stores in the UK could claim a free coffee. In this way, Facebook Deals provides brands and retailers with the opportunity to give fans offers and promotions directly when they Check-In near their store using their phones.

The benefits are clear:  brands can use Facebook Deals as a virtual loyalty card or coupon system. Since its  launch in January 2011, it has attracted a host of big name brands such as the aforementioned Starbucks, Argos and O2.

However it can also benefit smaller businesses, who sometimes find it difficult to see the benefits of having a Facebook presence. Deals provides them with a scalable, manageable, low cost way to offer discounts and encourage people to visit their store.

Facebook Commerce There’s a real feeling among a lot of people in the industry that F-commerce, as it has been named, is the second online commerce revolution. You can now rent films, book plane tickets, make donations to charities, purchase clothes and even buy Tomato Sauce – all through branded Facebook Store tabs.

The rise of F-commerce has transformed Facebook Pages, allowing brands to not only engage with fans but also sell to them. Brands can create a store within a Facebook tab, creating a retail environment that never takes the user away from Facebook. This provides brands with a huge captive audience.

Alternatively brands can utilise ‘Facebook-Facilitated On-Site Selling’which allows them to use a social plug-in to bring the Facebook experience to their websites. Using Facebook’s Open Graph API to retrieve the Likes and interests of the user also means brands can tailor their website to the user’s interests.

Facebook Credits On July 1st 2011 Facebook Credits became the mandatory virtual currency for buying virtual goods in games and apps on Facebook. And, even though Facebook seems to be content working at this level at the moment, the growth potential of Facebook Credits is huge.  It has already been used by brands like the BBC to pay for content.

The next step in Facebook Credits’ growth could be to embed a ‘Buy with Facebook’ button on every online retailer’s website so Credits becomes the currency to be used across the entire web, providing a fully integrated e-commerce solution.

Facebook monetisation – the bottom line A crucial part of any brand’s business strategy is obviously to monetise their social spaces. It also makes complete sense – it allows you to take your company to where your customers are.

There are more than 30 million people on Facebook in the UK alone (out of a global potential of over 700 million). The rise of monetisation opportunities such as Facebook Deals and F-Commerce means Facebook now provides a tangible difference to a business’ bottom line.

Building communities or bubbles?

June 14, 2011

The increasing personalisation of the web has been heralded as a great leap forward – it offers a personalised online experience, using search history and cookies to provide online users with highly relevant content that has been customised just for them. The effects of this can already be seen with social media and search now giving users a streamlined experience based on their unique interests.

However, this positive view has been challenged. According to a fascinating extract from ‘The Filter Bubble’ by Eli Pariser in the Guardian article at the weekend, “the race to know as much as possible about you has become the central battle of the era for internet giants like Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft.”

He argues this is creating a blinkered view of the world based on narrow interests and just your own personal tastes.  These ‘internet giants’ are ‘prediction engines’ who look at your online activity and try to create a personalised experience which they feel reflects these interests and ‘Likes’. From Facebook’s newsfeed to retargeted ads this is happening throughout the web:

  • Facebook: Facebook’s EdgeRank uses the information that Facebook has on users to provide a personalised newsfeed based on how often they interact with certain people and Pages (read our post on ‘Top 5 Tips for improving your Facebook EdgeRankhere). With personalised news feeds becoming a primary news source for many people this will have a big effect on the news they receive.
  • Google: Google use 57 signals – from where you log in from to what your searched history – to try to predict what kinds of sites you’d like. To put it simply, there is no set Google search any more – it is all based on that user’s unique activity.
  • Amazon: the online retailer sells billions of dollars by using its algorithms to predict what each customer is interested in and putting it on their own personal homepage.
  • Retargeting: cookies allow businesses to store and track information such as age, location, passwords and other personal data. They can then embed this data and target the user with personalised, relevant content and ads. This is why if you search for a pair of shoes you will see the same shoes in banner ads as you browse the web.

The main problem of all this customisation to Pariser is that “As a consumer, it’s hard to argue with blotting out the irrelevant and unlikable. But what is good for consumers is not necessarily good for citizens. What I seem to like may not be what I actually want, let alone what I need to know to be an informed member of my community or country.”  Furthermore, he also states that you create your own vacuum where “more and more, your computer monitor is a kind of one-way mirror, reflecting your own interests while algorithmic observers watch what you click.”

While Pariser puts forward an interesting argument and articulates it very well, personalisation has always been the holy grail of the internet. As Yahoo Vice President Tapan Bhat has stated: “The future of the web is about personalisation.  It’s about weaving the web together in a way that is smart and personalised for the user.”

This is the point. Providing the user with a personalised online experience makes it more relevant, more efficient and, therefore, more enjoyable. It is certainly a much better experience than the previous scattergun approach where adverts bore no relation to what the user was interested in.

Of course, there needs to be a balance between this and presenting people with an unknowingly self-serving version of the internet which presents to you views which you already hold. However, if this balance is achieved then social media and search can provide an incredibly useful and powerful way to find what you want in an environment in which people can contribute, interact and shape the conversation themselves.

Top 5 Tips for improving your Facebook EdgeRank

May 12, 2011

Ever wondered why your brand’s Facebook Page is not receiving as many Likes and comments as you hoped for? It could well be that many of your Fans have not even seen your post due to Facebook’s EdgeRank system. EdgeRank is Facebook’s unique algorithm which decides what posts appear in the ‘Top News’ stream, the default Page when you log on to Facebook.

Nobody outside Facebook completely understands the unique (and top secret) factors that enable a post to be positioned at the top of the ‘Top News’ results page.  It is, however, largely based on three main factors: affinity, weight and timing. When these factors are combined they have the ability to push content to the News Feed’s ‘Top News’ page.

EdgeRank, then, challenges brands to produce appealing and engaging content in order to ensure they are seen above other brands. Here are our Top 5 tips on how to optimise your content so that it will appear on the ‘Top News’ page:

1. Encourage audience engagement

EdgeRank is weighted so that activities that require higher levels of user engagement get a higher score than those that don’t. So, instead of just aiming for Likes, brands need to get people to comment on, and share, their content.

If brands want increased fan participation they need to provide something that people want to engage with. With social media you are fighting for people’s hard earned attention – brands must offer content that is worth their audience’s time.  As with all social media it is about having relevant conversations. You must ask questions and not just push out content and hope that people will respond. It has been proven that posts which include a clear and simple call to action achieve higher engagement levels.

So: make your posts fun, timely and engaging and ask your Fans to join in with you (for example, through asking for user generated content, product feedback or running competitions). You’ll be surprised how many will enthusiastically do so.

2. Personalise your brand on Facebook

It’s important to remember that, when it comes to EdgeRank, manual posts have more weight than posts automated through apps.  More than this, your Facebook Page needs to be human and personalised. You must develop a relationship with your audience: be ready to thank them for their replies and for sharing their opinions with you.

Each social platform demands a bespoke tone of voice and content strategy – this is vital when it comes to engaging with your fans on Facebook. They can tell which posts are automated or those that have been written for Twitter (e.g. featuring hashtags) and which have been personalised – and for this reason auto posts do not produce as much engagement.

Efficiency and timesaving is important in the social sphere but when it leads to a decrease in engagement it simply isn’t worth it.  Show your fans you care enough to personalise each post and respond to their queries and opinions.

3. Stand out with rich media

With so many brands on Facebook it can be easy for your brand messages to get lost in a sea of content. Videos and photos are a way to ensure that your content stands out – plus, this type of rich media always performs well on Facebook. People love rich media content – videos and photos are much more immediate and, in many instances, more interesting than lengthy text updates which means people are more likely to engage with them. This engagement means that your posts will appear in the ‘Top News’ of your Fans’ News Feed.

Depending upon the brand, sometimes text based status updates aren’t engaging enough to push your posts into the ‘Top News’ Feed. Videos and photos are more likely to grab people’s attention and they also seem to be a favoured by the News Feed algorithm, carrying a high weight score that will influence EdgeRank.

Use these videos to increase engagement. Don’t just push out this content, ask people what they think and contextualise it with a question. Getting people to comment will then add a highly weighted interaction score and build affinity with new users.

4. Timing is the key

Social media is all about timing, in all its senses. With the need for brands to publish content that naturally creates discussions and that people will have an opinion about, making it timely is crucial. The more time-relevant the post the more effective it will be in engaging people and drawing responses from them. This could be seen recently in the UK with so many brands citing the Royal Wedding in their posts.

Facebook is also a fantastic way to drive promotion of time-sensitive campaigns. If there is a deal being run or you want to count down to the close of a competition, Facebook is an ideal platform to successfully engage. As timing and relevancy is so central to the EdgeRank algorithm, posts that contain content relating to this kind of promotion will have greater success in appearing in the News Feed.

Timing in another way is also crucial. You need to understand the best times to post – analyse the responses on your Page and leverage these insights to post at the best possible time. Knowing the optimum frequency of these posts is also crucial. You don’t want to overwhelm your fans with too many posts.

5. Use the data

Brands need to take advantage of Facebook Insights in order to understand their audience and what content they are interested in. Facebook provides a range of data that will highlight what works and what doesn’t. Analyse the average number of comments and Likes for your posts and look out for trends. These insights can be used to construct a messaging plan that will maximise engagement.

It is important to keep a constant eye on what is happening and tweak messages to make sure all content is optimised.  Use the insights provided to make the most of the topics that consistently do well – and drop the ones that never perform. It sounds obvious but you’d be amazed by how many big brands push out the same content that gets little or no engagement.

Originally posted on Social Media Week’s blog.

Top 5 Tips for Social Commerce

April 20, 2011

Will Facebook commerce be the game changer in 2011? There’s a real feeling among a lot of people in the industry that social commerce is the second online commerce revolution. Many brands have already started to utilize Facebook as an e-commerce platform and it will become increasingly important for businesses to use Facebook to deliver a truly social shopping experience.

Here are five tips to make the most from Facebook Commerce:

1. Make the User Journey as Easy as Possible

Given that Facebook commerce is still in relative infancy, businesses need to clearly demonstrate that buying from Facebook stores is easy and beneficial.

For Facebook commerce to maximize its potential Facebook needs to mirror traditional e-commerce in terms of proving its usability, customer service, security and privacy – as well as its ability to generate revenue. Businesses also need to clearly demonstrate the unique value proposition of a Facebook store compared to a brand’s website by providing instant rewards and unique personalized relationships as well as providing a clear call to action.

Greater transparency in terms of user experience, along with improvements and innovations which will simplify the process such as accepting Facebook Credits – Facebook’s own currency – for payment, can also only help to make the Facebook commerce proposition even more popular.

It shouldn’t be difficult to get Facebook users on board: the ability to have a complete brand experience – from engagement and product browsing right through to checkout – without having to navigate anywhere else is an extremely appealing one.

2. Remember it’s SOCIAL Commerce

For Facebook Commerce to be successful brands need to remember that this is social media. That means the Facebook Store shouldn’t simply be a bolt on to your Facebook Page, it should be a fully integrated part of the user’s social experience.

It might sound strange to not only talk about selling when it comes to social commerce but the idea is to use e-commerce to enhance the social aspects of your Facebook presence. There must be a smooth transition between engagement on the Wall and the user making a purchase – everything must connect. Brands must foster meaningful and personalized engagement with their fans before they focus on selling them anything.

The point is that you need to remain genuinely social by giving consumers the ability to engage in conversations about the brand and product with you and their peers. Your Facebook Page has to be your shop window, your customer service center and your store.

3. Monitor to Personalise

One of the great benefits of Facebook commerce is the opportunity to understand what your customers buy and what they want and use this to provide a personalized user experience.

Facebook has developed a range of tools that allows brands to gain further insights about their customers. Facebook Insights allow you to track the performance of your e-commerce platform – this includes metrics for specific features such as ‘Likes’ and shares as well as demographic information and user behavior. This information can then be used to understand what messages, deals and rewards will be most effective in gaining customers and maximizing sales.

This ability to understand your audience and tailor how and when you communicate with them is what makes social e-commerce such a compelling solution for brands.

4. Provide Exclusive Content

If customers are unsure whether to purchase through Facebook then one way to encourage them to engage and buy is to use social commerce to offer your customers a unique buying experience.

Be innovative. Make your brand stand out. Facebook provides all the tools you need to create a personalized relationship with customers and make them feel unique by offering exclusive Facebook deals and offers.

There are many examples of brands providing a special value proposition such as products ‘only available on Facebook’, one-time-only availability and offers limited to Fans of the Page to make products compelling. You can also reward loyalty by providing incentives for customers buying through Facebook.

Other innovative features have seen brands create Pop-Up Shops and integrate a wish-list into their Facebook store. You can also use ‘fan-gating’ so that content becomes exclusively available only to Fans of your brand or who ‘Like’ your posts.

5. More than the Facebook store

We’ve talked here about Facebook commerce as the Facebook store. However, you can also take Facebook to your e-commerce site by using the Facebook Open Graph Protocol and social plugins. These tools integrate Facebook into a business’ website enabling them to use Facebook member data to display information, goods and services tailored specifically to that user’s interests.

For users this means a personalized web experience based on their tastes, interests and relationships. For brands, by implementing a few lines of code, it means they can provide highly customized engagement experiences for their consumers. For example, retailers can utilize Facebook member data in their e-commerce sites to recommend certain products and allow people to easily share things they like.

Some of the biggest brands in the world such as Amazon, Levis and Trip Advisor have done this very successfully – integrating with Facebook to offer instant personalization and allowing people to share what they like with their friends on Facebook.

The Future for Social Commerce

Why is Facebook Commerce such an enticing prospect for marketers and businesses? Well, it offers a unique amalgamation of sales and marketing, where you can seamlessly turn a Fan into a customer. It also makes complete sense – it allows you to take your company to where your customers are. With 600 million users that place is Facebook.

This post was first published on Social Media Week.

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