Social media has become a wide array. From the day different platforms were introduced, and when Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter became prominent, everyone is fully engaged. Most of the influencers, small and large businesses run to social media for advertising, promotions, and connecting to people.
Strategies and tools like paid campaigns, boosted posts and insights also emerge helping to achieve their goals. While this is one of the good games, the next big thing or question upon reaching people is authenticity.
Authenticity unlike any other is not a metric. It’s not measurable, but this is something that when you read or see, you will know and feel whether a thing is credible or not. In simple terms, authenticity is staying true to who you are, what you do or who you serve.
1. Be honest and transparent
Authenticity isn’t something created but a result of great honesty and transparency.
Our news feeds have been overly exposed to a picture-perfect advertisement of all types, highly edited videos or photos and people are getting tired of the things that feel fake or too commercialized. Some also pay influencers for their brands and let them do the job. People can easily recognize whether it is true or not. So when it comes to branding, make sure that your content is not one of them. Remember that an honest brand shall deliver an accurate message consistently.
So now, stop being so perfect, instead start being “real.”
Why not post a behind the scene photos sometimes, put a story on how it was done, the people involved instead of an actual edited photo and describing the specification itself. Find stories within the company that either makes you happy or sad and share those stories. Show your company culture, how they love working and creating kinds of stuff.
Make it personable and more humane. Put yourself in the shoe of your audience, so you will always understand what they want and how they want to be treated. Alienating, faking and being scripted at all times is hard to maintain, so always keep your brand sincere and real.
2. Skip the calls to action for a second
While the primary goal of your digital presence or strategy is to create conversion or a sale, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be putting up a “Call to Actions” every now and then.
Your brand needs to connect fully, and full connection means they will always remember you and will still be their priority. Hard selling can easily be detected, and we know that no one wants it, even each one of us. When they feel that they are being asked to buy hardly for the first time, for the second time and on their usual days, tendencies are they’ll go away, disconnect or unfollow.
What you need to do is to let them engage. Provide posts or content that they will feel that they are the most important. Let them know that your brand is doing or solving their problems rather than focusing on product promotion.
Remember that people nowadays no longer buy the product or service itself; instead, they are more into buying experience and how they feel after. When
they think genuine in you, they’ll automatically search and buy even if you don’t put a “Call to Action” in every encounter you are having.
After all, it boils down into one. Have a good intention. Offer value and people will stick with you.
3. If you mess up, own it
This is still connected to being honest and transparent. No one is perfect. Everyone commits a mistake, and your brand is not exempted. It’s just easy to hear but in the digital world with your brand needed to be protected, having an error is an issue.
We all know that everything in social media is just one click away. Once content landed our news feed, we can easily like, put comments, share and even make it viral. So instead of just deleting the post or ignoring your mistake, better own it.
Be fully accountable for all that’s happening on your brand. Don’t let them think that you are hiding or pretending. Saying sorry or telling that you have done wrong is always a good one. In this case, your audience will respect, appreciate and will trust you even more.
4. Click Bait headlines are a thing of the past
Have you ever experienced seeing links or headlines that are intriguing or a curious one, those with lavish imaginary drawings or pictures, that in just a few seconds, you click with no hesitations? Yes, you are right; those are clickbait!
Clickbait is the lowest form of social media journalism that was adapted from yellow journalism. While clickbait may generally increase your page views, this one isn’t good in terms of keeping your brand in the game.
Your audience may probably open or the link, but they will not read it. According to Chartbeat, fewer than 60 percent of users on average read more than half of an article. And Peyman Nilforoush, says that one-third of readers who click on promoted content tend to leave before 15 seconds.
Clickbait may not harm you at first, but this may damage your brand reputation in the long run. People may not trust you anymore and may not open any links you will be providing even you set your content to a true one.
So never be blinded in overusing this, instead create a headline that is true with a relative content all the time.
Conclusion
Whatever social media platform you would like to pursue with your brand, being genuine is still the best way. Try your best to be real so that you can connect with your audience freely, inspiring them to be sure and be loyal to you. Remember that authenticity is the key driver of trust and a key to growing your business.
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