By Nikita Geldenhuys
Balkind has been following the evolution of social media since he first started working in the online space. A co-founder of the JHB Live online magazine, he has watched social media grow into a powerful industry, but also into a term that is often misinterpreted.
“Social media is an overused and often misunderstood word and industry,” he explains, preferring to divide social media activities into two segments. The first is actions that build a brand’s presence on social media, while the second involves advertising a brand’s products or services.
In Balkind’s opinion, social media performs three key functions when it comes to building brand presence. A social media platform can act as a form of call centre, enabling consumers to vent their frustrations or instantly engage with a brand. It also serves as a platform on which consumers can acknowledge products or services they can associate with, by simply liking a brand.
“A third function is the relationship role social media plays. Some people have a deep connection with brands and love to hear from them. These brands often lend themselves to good content that people ‘want’ to consume on a regular basis.”
This process of creating content and engaging with consumers on this level is seen as social media management. It is, however as Balkind alludes to, very different from online advertising and marketing activities.
All agencies are not created equal
“Advertising and marketing’s sole purpose is to get a brand in front of people’s faces and say ‘Hi! I exist, I’m better than the rest, so please buy me’. The problem is that social media management and advertising are getting completely mixed up,” continues Balkind.
He explains the early players in the social media industry mainly built websites for clients. These digital agencies popped up in the dot-com era to serve the demand for web-based services like sites, electronic newsletters and online marketing collateral. When social media was introduced, clients struggled to differentiate between social and web activities, as they all seemed part of digital.
Since then, social platforms have changed human behaviour. Instead of spending time consuming magazines, broadcast television, and radio, we now read articles recommended on social media, listen to podcasts, and spend time exchanging images or videos with friends.
“Everyone recognises the way we advertise or reach people has changed, yet brands are using digital agencies for both social media management and advertising. We typically have call centre-type employees, copy writers, and content creators all developing campaigns for social media. This is not the right way to do things and leads to ineffective advertising,” Balkind says.
Divide and conquer digital operations
He recommends that brands separate social media management from advertising. Management of social media should protect brands in the social space, while advertising should use the strengths of these platforms to create highly impactful campaigns.
Balkind believes the industry should also distinguish between advertising services and content creation.
“Google keywords, social media management, websites, and newsletters are an essential part of the marketing mix, but it’s not advertising. Engaging with people in the social media space for the sake of advertising requires a completely different skill set. It is one that I don’t believe can be provided by the same account manager that also handles content,” Balkind says.
“The solution, as we see it, is audience engagement agencies. Audience engagement recognises that brands need time with consumers and addresses the industry’s challenge of reaching consumers through new, non-traditional channels.”
The complexities of engagement
Social media engagement has many benefits, but should always be driven by strategy. “I feel brands need to be careful how they spend their money,” adds Balkind. “Right now, most of them have the call centre, which is run internally or by an agency. Yet, in many cases, I feel money is being wasted on unnecessary community engagement for the sake of engagement.”
Measuring engagement also involves much more than just counting likes, shares, and retweets. Clients might be persuaded that campaigns were successful based on these figures, but determining the quality of engagements is, in fact, much harder.
“The brand’s video might have been viewed a large number of times, but 95% of people viewing it might have watched it for five seconds instead of the full 90 seconds. The strength of engagements on networks such as Facebook and Twitter is also influenced by the noise or ‘clutter’ on these platforms. The user is surrounded with hundreds of other messages, leading to weak engagement.”
His advice? Advertising needs to go back to its core of very powerful storytelling. “The story or concept is what will drive successful campaigning in the new virtual world.”