I recently presented on “The power of Pinterest, Instagram & YouTube” for the FranSummit and there are some really powerful numbers you need to know if you are thinking about participating on these platforms, if you already are, and why you NEED to be.
YouTube is the 2nd busiest search engine after its parent, Google. So why wouldn’t you want to be advertising your brand there? Here are some statistics to help convince you to get started.
-There are 72 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute.
-100 million people take a social action on YouTube (likes, shares, comments, etc) every week.
-Clicks on the ‘like’ or ‘dislike’ button on YouTube have doubled since the start of 2011.
-For every ‘dislike,’ YouTube gets 10 ‘likes’- people like to tell other people about the stuff they love. Give them a reason to love you, and be a brand advocate for your business.
-Generate Customer Video Testimonials for your business; have a valued customer discuss one of your products that they love, or a recent service you provided them.
-Record a How-To video of a new product or service; show how to use your new product, such as a blender. Show how to assemble your product and the different options that are available for blending. Heck, throw in some awesome recipe ideas and show how easy it is to create great food using your product.
One of the best advantages to hosting your videos on YouTube is their user-friendly video editor (above). You can easily edit videos by cutting out certain sections, apply visual effects, add captions and audio, and it’s FREE. You no longer have any excuses, create a YouTube channel today!
Where can you share those videos that you create and upload to YouTube? Why Pinterest of course!
Online sharing service Shareaholic just released new data showing that Pinterest is now beating out Twitter, StumbleUpon, Bing, and Google in referral traffic. When you add a Pinterest plug-in to your browser and “pin” images from your website to Pinterest they will be linked directly back to your site, this is a great way to get new visitors.
Pinterest doesn’t talk user numbers but is currently estimated to have around 20 million users, based on third-party sources, and nearly 80% of Pinterest’s users are women, most between the ages of 25 and 54.
So what should a brand feature on their Pinterest page, and what kind of boards should you create?
“When you open up Pinterest,” the CEO of Pinterest says, “you should feel like you’ve walked into a building full of stuff that only you are interested in. Everything should feel handpicked for you.”
Starbucks talks about coffee but also other things that might interest their followers, such as architecture and food. Show a variety of images to entice people to follow you, appeal to all of their interests, not just one.
Pinterest makes it easy for running contests, and the social plugins for each user makes it great for increasing visibility for your brand or contest on other social networks. You can tweet every pin, and share every pin to Facebook. Give it a shot and see how it goes, you never know your best customers could be “Pinners.”
Instagram has 100 Million Users, as of Sept 11th. The majority of Instagram users were between the ages of 18 and 34. It is said that Women Prefer Pinterest, and Young Adults Choose Instagram.
You’re probably wondering if your brand needs to be on Instagram, especially since I just stated that the majority of users are young adults between the ages of 18 & 34.
The first step is to do a hashtag search of your brand on Instagram. If your product is used on a daily basis, you’ll likely find that people are already taking photos of your products and talking about them on Instagram. If you’re Tasti D-Lite you’ll most likely find hundreds of photos, but if you offer plumbing services you may find none. Research before you start to make sure it’s worth your effort, and make sure to set goals so you can track your progress.
Whole Foods has built its following on Instagram to nearly 70,000. Whole Foods doesn’t post what you would expect. The first page of photos for the brand is a collection of nature photos, there are some food images but they are trying to appeal to everyone, not just the foodies. As is the rule with any new social media venture, remember that this isn’t a billboard to brag about your business, it’s a conversation. Find a way to talk with your customers, and as Guy Kawsaki says “enchant them.”
All three of these social networks are great places to connect with consumers, know your target audience and the goals for your campaign then pick the network that best suits your business needs.
You can see the slides from my FranSummit presentation on SlideShare. My notes are not included but a majority is listed in this blog post.
Do you market your brand on any of the above social networks? Which one is your favorite?