by Jennifer Hart Yim | Jun 12, 2019 | Blog, Marketing, Marketing Automation, Social Media
Automation can make your social media marketing more efficient and effective, allowing you more time to develop and execute other marketing campaigns. Here are 11 social media marketing mistakes to avoid.
Social media automation is quite a controversial marketing topic. The critics cry, “Social media is supposed to be social!” The supporters retort, “It’s all about efficiency!” Surely, there’s a middle ground, right? Just look at those adorable little robot eyes. Automation can’t be all bad, right?
We certainly agree. Social media automation can be done right. Just avoid the following 11 awful social media automation mistakes, and you’ll be good to go.
11 Awful Social Media Automation Mistakes Marketers Should Stop Making
1. You’re Scared of It.
Are you one of those social media automation critics we mentioned in the intro? Stop being such a fraidy cat … you’re missing out! When done right, automation can make your social media marketing more efficient and effective, allowing you more time to develop and execute other marketing campaigns and promotions. We’ve even developed a simple, customizable social media scheduling template and blog post guide to help you organize and plan your social media updates for the most popular social networks. Just avoid the rest of the mistakes on this list, and you’re golden. Guilty social automation conscience begone!
2. You’re Using Way Too Much of It.
Remember: too much of anything is usually bad, and the overuse of social media automation is usually what makes the automation critics cringe the most. First, you need to find the right balance of updates for each of the social networks you’re participating in. This involves testing and optimization to determine your ideal publishing frequency, and it usually involves pushing the limit a little bit. Try increasing the number of updates you currently publish and gauge your fans’/followers’ reactions. You might be surprised that you can update more than you thought and that you get a nice little lead bumps as a bonus!
Remember, the half-life ( the time it takes a link to receive half the clicks it will ever receive after it’s reached its peak) of a link shared on Twitter is only 2.8 hours, which means it’s acceptable to publish fairly frequently. On Facebook, updates last a little bit longer, so you don’t need to publish quite as much. Our social media publishing template recommends starting with 8 tweets a day, 4 Facebook updates, and 3 LinkedIn updates. Which leads us to our next mistake …
3. You Leave No Room for Ad Hoc Updates.
Don’t automate so much content in social media that you’re really pushing it if something last minute pops up that you really want to post an update about on your social networks. Things come up. You’re behind on your leads goal and you just created an awesome new ebook that you want to promote via social? You shouldn’t feel guilty about popping in a tweet or two about it in addition to your scheduled, automated updates. Or maybe you did some awesome newsjacking and you want your fans and followers to know about it right away. Don’t overdo it with the scheduled updates that you have to sacrifice those last-minute opportunities that arise.
4. You’re Setting it and Forgetting It.
Schedule and automate your social media updates and there’s no reason to check your social media accounts until the next batch of updates needs to be uploaded to HootSuite, right? WRONG. Do this, and you should be subjected to the wrath of social media automation critics. Just because you’re automating some updates, doesn’t mean you’re off the hook for monitoring the conversation — and participating in it. You still need to monitor the discussion happening around your content, answering your fans’ and followers’ questions, and, that’s right … engaging. In real time, or close to it. And with all the social media monitoring tools available to make it easier to do, there’s no excuse not to.
5. You’re Hiring an Agency to Manage It and Not Properly Setting Expectations.
Let’s relive the story of a former HubSpot employee who fell victim to some very unfortunate, poorly executed social media automation. What happened was, AT&T hired a marketing agency to execute its Ticket Chasers Twitter campaign for March Madness. The intent of the campaign was to target people who would be interested in the content of the program with personalized tweets: bloggers (who would get the word out about Ticket Chasers), people who live in the cities in which the Ticket Chasers promotion is occurring, and people who mention basketball or March Madness. Except what ended up happening was the agency targeting people that fit these criteria even if they weren’t followers of AT&T — and a very spammy Twitter presence.
The lesson is this: If you’re going to outsource any type of automation, make sure you set some very clear and specific expectations with your agency up front — both for what constitutes proper targeting and automation, and how frequently the campaign should be monitored so there could be a quick response if something goes awry.
6. Your Scheduled Updates Even SOUND Robotic.
Just because you’re scheduling automated updates doesn’t mean it has to sound like a robot wrote the copy. Spend some time carefully crafting your social media updates, and for goodness’ sake, infuse some personality into them! It should sound like a human took the time to craft the update because a human did take the time to create them, right?
7. Your Content Is Stale or Unremarkable.
Nothing indicates a low-quality social media presence like unremarkable content. Whether you’re manually updating your social networks or using automation to make your social media marketing more efficient, it’s all about the content of your updates. Share awesome content that your audience cares about, and they won’t mind that you may have scheduled it in advance. If you’re using HubSpot’s free social media scheduling template, keep your content repository tab stocked with a mix of awesome evergreen content that never gets stale and can be re-promoted over time, as well as new content and offers you create over time.
8. Your Timing Is Way Off.
Just scheduling updates all willy nilly without strategizing about timing? Think about it. Should that online coupon you’re sharing really get tweeted on the 12th when it expires on the 11th? Probably not. Be careful — nothing smells like stinky automation more than careless planning and timing. Should that offer, which just so happens to be targeted at your international prospects in Mumbai, be posted to your Facebook business page at 5 PM ET? Remember, it’s 2:30 AM in Mumbai. Be sure you’re scheduling your updates for times that make sense for your audience, and don’t be afraid to do some testing and experimentation to determine exactly what that optimal timing is.
9. You Treat Scheduled Updates the Same Way on All Social Networks.
Not all social networks are the same, so don’t treat your updates like they’re one-size-fits-all. Each has its own guidelines, tone, and different types of users, so make sure you tailor your updates to appeal to each social network’s nuances. For example, your Twitter updates need to fit within 280 characters, but snippets that accompany links you share on LinkedIn and Facebook can be much longer. And LinkedIn caters to a much more professional audience than, say, Facebook. And remember, you can reuse a lot of the same content across social networks; it’s how you frame and position that content that should be tweaked.
10. You’re Not Measuring Results and Adjusting Accordingly.
Trying to pick your best content for your automated updates? Attempting to determine the optimal timing and frequency of your updates for each social network? You’re probably going to need to rely on your analytics for all those things, don’t you think? Make use of your marketing analytics to identify the content and offers that tend to perform well in social media so you can promote more of the types of content that work, and nix the types that don’t. Track your leads and referral traffic from social media, coupled with qualitative data on how your fans/followers react to timing and frequency, so you can optimize those techniques as well.
11. You’re Not Adding Sharing Links to Your Content.
That’s right — think of it as social media automation enablement. Adding social media sharing links/buttons to all your content, whether it’s a web/landing page, blog post, within an ebook, in an email, makes it easy for your audience to spread your content for you, and expand your reach. It’s sort of like automating evangelism! It might sound sneaky, but your audience will probably appreciate that you’ve done some of the work involved in sharing content for them. People are always looking for social sharing fodder, and if your content is awesome, it’ll make them look like a valuable social media connection who shares great stuff!
Are you making effective use of social media automation? What else would you add to this list of social automation mistakes?
This article was written by Pamela Vaughan. Pamela is a Principal Marketing Manager, Website CRO & Copywriting at HubSpot. She is best known for introducing the concept of historical optimization, which increased organic search traffic and leads for HubSpot’s blog by more than 200%.
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by Elizabeth Hines | Mar 20, 2019 | Blog, Logistics, Robotics & Automation, Supply Chain
With the power to drastically increase efficiency in all areas of the supply chain, it’s important brands are exploring the benefits of AI. Here are four examples of how AI can benefit your supply chain.
Highlights:
- It’s estimated that supply chain firms could gain $1.3 to $2 trillion a year from using AI.
- Machine learning has the ability to quickly discover patterns in supply chain data by relying on algorithms and constraint-based modeling to find the most influential factors.
- The increasing popularity of chatbots is making it harder to ignore how AI is helping shape not just the daily logistics but also the B2B marketing landscape and operational procurement for supply chain industries.
Artificial intelligence is not simply affecting supply chain management, it is revolutionizing it.
With the power to drastically increase efficiency in all areas of the supply chain, McKinsey estimates that firms could gain $1.3 trillion to $2 trillion a year from using AI in supply chain and manufacturing.
Here are 4 examples of AI and how it’s changing supply chain management for the better.
1. Autonomous transport
There’s nothing more exciting than the field of autonomous transport for SCM. We’ve all known for many years that driverless trucks have major potential to affect supply chain management and logisitics.
We aren’t there yet – and “anyone employed as a driver today will be able to retire as a driver” — but if autonomous trucking can be developed to its potential, the technology would effectively double the output of the U.S. transportation network at 25 percent of the cost.
The conversation is no longer simply talking about vehicles on the road either. Google and Rolls-Royce recently partnered to build autonomous ships too.
2. Final-mile delivery route efficiency
One doesn’t have to have a driverless vehicle, however, to use AI to optimize delivery logistics.
For example, in the “devilishly complex” task of delivering 25 packages by van, the number of possible routes adds up to around 15 septillion (that’s a trillion trillion).
That’s where route optimization software and AI-powered GPS tools like ORION — which UPS uses to create the most efficient routes for its fleet — are making their mark. With ORION, customers, drivers and vehicles submit data to the machine, which then uses algorithms to creates the most up-to-date optimal routes depending on road conditions and other factors.
And there are also other autonomous entities out there besides cars, trucks, and ships. Robots using LIDAR technology are now being used to deliver items in crowded city environments. For example, Marble’s robots deliver medicine, groceries, and packages, and they also track their routes and the condition in order to continuously improve delivery for the next time. Additionally, last-mile solutions with drones continue to be explored due to their ability to move quickly and bypass almost all ground-level obstacles.
3. Demand forecasting, particularly for warehouse management and SCM strategy
Machine learning has the ability to quickly discover patterns in supply chain data by relying on algorithms and constraint-based modeling to find the most influential factors. This ability to find data patterns without human intervention has applications in EVERY aspect of SCM, but demand forecasting is a particularly influential component beneficiary.
Warehouse management and SCM strategy rely heavily on correct supply, demand, and inventory-based management. Forecasting engines with machine learning offer an entirely new level of intelligence and predictive analysis of big data sets that provides an endless (and constantly self-improving) loop of forecasting, overhauling the way we manage inventory and the way we create new strategies for our industries.
4. Chatbots for marketing and operational procurement
The increasing popularity of chatbots is making it harder to ignore how AI is helping shape not just the daily logistics but also the B2B marketing landscape and operational procurement for supply chain industries.
A chatbot is a computer program that simulates human conversation using auditory or textual methods. It communicates with your customer inside a messaging app, like Facebook Messenger, and is similar to email marketing without landing in an inbox. Mimicking a human conversation, chatbots currently allow for increased customer engagement through messaging app technology that isn’t yet saturated with marketing. They are just one of the many ways to integrate AI and marketing.
There’s so much more than these 4 examples to consider when discussing AI and the supply chain: prediction of delivery arrival times to the warehouse and to the customer, cargo sensors, automated purchasing, financial applications…the list literally may be endless.
Choosing what to focus on for this article, and more importantly, for all supply chain and logistics businesses, is a tough decision, but one thing is clear: in the “arms race” to leverage AI in SCM, some will come out on top and some will be left behind.
This post originally appeared on EBN Online.
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by Fronetics | Feb 27, 2019 | Blog, Marketing, SEO, Website Development
SEO helps your website rank higher in search engine results pages. Here are the SEO basics to get your website performing better and in front of your target audience.
Highlights:
- SEO stands for search engine optimization — that much has stayed the same. It refers to techniques that help your website rank higher in search engine results pages.
- SEO works by optimizing a website’s pages, conducting keyword research, and earning inbound links.
- To rank well in the long term, build your SEO marketing strategy around topics, not keywords.
Video transcript:
I’m Jennifer Yim and I’m the Director of Strategy here at Fronetics. Today’s topic is SEO. SEO seems pretty straightforward. You pick a few keywords and your page is magically optimized for SEO, right? Not quite.
People understand the basic principles of SEO, but a lot has changed in the last decade. Let’s take a look at the basics to get your site ranking higher.
SEO stands for search engine optimization — that much has stayed the same. It refers to techniques that help your website rank higher in search engine results pages. This makes your website more visible to people who are looking for solutions that your brand, product, or service can provide by search engines like Google, Yahoo!, and Bing.
What hasn’t stayed the same are the techniques we use to improve our rankings. This has everything to do with the search algorithms that these companies constantly change.
SEO works by optimizing a website’s pages, conducting keyword research, and earning inbound links. You can generally see results of SEO efforts once the webpage has been crawled and indexed by a search engine.
There are a ton of ways to improve the SEO of your site pages. Search engines look for elements including title tags, keywords, image tags, internal link structure, and inbound links.
Search engines also look at site structure and design, visitor behavior, and other external, off-site factors to determine how highly ranked your site should be in their results pages.
To rank well in the long term, build your SEO marketing strategy around topics, not keywords. If you do that, you’ll find you can naturally optimize for important keywords, anyway. Understanding your target audience and what interests them is key to attracting relevant visitors to your website through search engines.
For more tips on improving SEO and building your digital marketing strategy, visit us at Fronetics.com.
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by Fronetics | Feb 12, 2019 | Blog, Marketing, Social Media, Supply Chain
Transparency in your supply chain through social media outlets can give a look inside your company in a way that your customers are craving.
Highlights:
- Customers have been demanding more visibility into supply chains of the products they purchase.
- Through social channels like Twitter , LinkedIn , and Facebook, companies are greatly enhancing their two-way communication with customers and sharing information with their stakeholders.
- The top reason that supply chain companies are choosing to participate in social media is to increase the visibility of their company.
Supply chain management is such a complicated web of factors that most companies choose to keep operations behind the scenes and unveil a finished product with an intense marketing roll-out.
But what if that’s backwards and an outdated approach to marketing? (Hint: It is.)
The complexity of supply chain management
There is no question that SCM can be deeply and frustratingly complex. Consider TechTarget’s definition of SCM: “the broad range of activities required to plan, control and execute a product’s flow, from acquiring raw materials and production through distribution to the final customer, in the most streamlined and cost-effective way.”
With so much intense analysis at every step, the details your supply chain management (SCM) team considers can seem endless, and the impressive knowledge they hold is certainly not something most people can understand.
Or can they? What if that mindset – the one that thinks that your SCM is so complex that it wouldn’t interest or be able to be grasped by your customers – is wrong?
In fact, what if it’s so wrong that you are missing something important? Customers today want to understand your supply chain.
Transparency in your supply chain
A common misconception is that most customers are interested in a final product. Of course, your final product better be outstanding, but there are other factors fueling today’s buyers, business-to-business (B2B) customers included.
For a few years now, customers have been demanding more visibility into supply chains of the products they purchase. For example, they want to ensure sustainable practices around the earth’s scarce resources, to know where their food is sourced, and to confirm ethical pay and conditions for any laborers involved. B2B buyers are no exception. They want their vendors to be more than just a final product too, and are constantly searching for value outside the sales funnel.
Transparency with social media
What if you shared what fueled your daily SCM decisions with your customers, stakeholders, and suppliers? Not every last complex detail…but some of them, and the intangibles too:
- What drives SCM decisions besides cost?
- Who is your SC team?
- Where are you sourcing?
- Why do you do things as you do during production?
Transparency of SCM through social media outlets can give a look inside your company in a way that your customers are craving. Through social channels like Twitter , LinkedIn , and Facebook, companies are greatly enhancing their two-way communication with customers and sharing information with their stakeholders.
Of course, the benefits of social media to SCM don’t stop there.The supply chain needs social media for enhanced customer communication, increased industry education, and an ability to socially monitor the market. Social media has the capability to empower your supply chain in multiple ways.
According to a survey we conducted, the top reason that supply chain companies are choosing to participate in social media is to increasing the visibility of their company (95%). Don’t simply focus on your final product(s) and leave out your supply chain! When you make your supply chain transparent to your customers and stakeholders, everyone wins.
This post originally appeared on EBN Online.
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by Fronetics | Sep 6, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Current Events, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
Digital natives are changing the landscape for B2B purchasing. Here’s what you need to know about the new B2B buyer.
Long gone are the days of men and women sitting around a conference table listening to a sales pitch over a free lunch. Today’s B2B buyers are younger, more technologically savvy, and more independent — they’re a generation of digital natives. And they’re making waves across the B2B buying landscape and changing how marketers must work to reach new customers.
[bctt tweet=”Today’s B2B buyers are younger, more technologically savvy, and more independent — they’re a generation of digital natives. And they’re making waves across the B2B buying landscape and changing how marketers must work to reach new customers.” username=”Fronetics”]
Who are digital natives?
The term digital native describes a person that grows up in the digital age, rather than acquiring familiarity with digital systems as an adult. So, unlike the previous generation, digital natives grew up understanding how to work a computer and a mobile phone instead of picking up these skills (slowly) in our 20s, 30s, or even later.
Having grown up in a time of rapid technological advancement, digital natives are very comfortable online. These skills have carried over to their professional careers, as millennials descend upon the workforce. Organic searches have become the starting point for researching products and services, instead of looking for specific brands.
Ch-ch-changes
This new reality means marketers trying to reach new customers must make big changes in the way they target and engage today’s buyers. Marketers have had to shift their focus from outbound marketing to inbound tactics, like content marketing, to engage and connect with their target audiences.
Here’s what you need to know about digital natives and how their tech-savvy ways have changed the B2B purchasing process.
Infographic: How digital natives are changing B2B purchasing
(Made with Canva)
Final thoughts
With so much content available on the internet, first impressions are everything. Your website needs to be informative and visually pleasing. Your social media posts need to be engaging. Your blog posts need to be enlightening. Make sure your online presence accurately depicts who you are as a brand and what you stand for. Digital natives will be more likely to find and connect with you.
Have digital natives had an impact on your business? Tell us about it.
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