By Nikita Geldenhuys

To what extent is Samsung Mobile South Africa’s Facebook marketing strategy geared towards light-hearted, playful, and fun content? Why is this approach important to the company?

Samsung’s overall social media strategy aims to create engaging content for our wide target audience – with the golden thread of aspiration and premium quality. Each campaign has a very distinct look and feel, from light and fun to artistic and intense. 

Shareability is obviously vital to any content as this is how a brand builds an emotional connection with a very fragmented, information-overloaded audience. Given that Samsung has a wide variety of products that cater to different consumers’ needs, the social media direction for each campaign has to be tailored to meet the specific target audience’s needs and keep their attention with our content. 

Content is also more fun and topical when you include public figures that are associated with your brand and relevant to your audience. One such a light-hearted, fun social campaign was our series of skits with our ambassador Maps Maponyane to increase awareness of our Galaxy S7 and S7 edge. Maps was perfectly aligned to Samsung’s brand goals of excellence, innovation, and discovery. 

How would you describe your audience’s response to content that is lively and lifestyle-orientated?

We receive far better response to content that is relevant to our audience. A central tenet of all Samsung social media content is to use not only lifestyle imagery, but also video. The latter is becoming vital to a successful social media strategy, social presence, and campaign objectives – as long as the content is relevant and tailored to fit each platform. 

For instance, Twitter and Facebook require completely different content because audience content needs vary by channel. Consumers are suffering from social media fatigue and, as such, you need to create lively content to get audiences to interact with your brand on their timeline.  

Please describe one of the company’s most successful posts and discuss possible reasons why this post was such a hit. 

The Galaxy A series 2016 awareness campaign is an example. Based on research about the target audience – which was millennials – we identified the kind of content that they wanted to see. We identified what would appeal to this audience visually and created content that was impactful and proved to have extremely high shareability and engagement. The posts were lifestyle oriented and tapped into contemporary millennial jargon with words that this demographic use on a daily basis. 

From your experience with Samsung’s social media successes, what are some of the key components of a killer Facebook social media strategy?

Social media success is a very broad term and there are many variables to consider. Organic reach, for instance, has become limited due to changing platform algorithms. It remains important to create content that consumers want to engage with to increase return on investment and give you the maximum exposure. 

Advertising also plays a big role in any through-the-line media strategy. The combination of various platforms that the consumer interacts with provides for a much richer experience with the brand.

In short, brilliant content and targeted advertising will deliver the social success vital to all business in our day and age. 

What trends have you noticed in how brands use, and audiences respond to, Facebook lately, and in which way will these trends shape the future of Facebook social media marketing?

Looking at the current Facebook landscape, brands are definitely increasing advertising budgets in a very competitive marketplace to capture share of voice. As organic reach declines, brands are finding creative ways of using Facebook to reach its consumers. Making use of ever-growing post and ad formats will ensure that brands stays relevant to the channel. Captivating content will also keep it relevant to its audience.

In an ever-changing digital landscape, success is never guaranteed because of the evolving needs and multiple moments of interaction with consumers. Perhaps the key to success lies in something as simple as being in touch with and knowing your target market so that you’re able to adapt and change with your audience.

Check out Samsung Mobile South Africa's Facebook Page.