Social media by the numbers
In 2021, Australian companies spent US$2.6bn* for advertising space on social media platforms. Social media paid advertising now makes up over 26%* of annual digital advertising spend by companies Australia-wide.
With over 21 million active social media users in Australia, social media platforms offer an eye-watering opportunity for many businesses to reach and connect with the hearts and minds of their ideal customers.
That’s all great, but what are the compelling use cases for businesses to incorporate social media paid advertising as part of their digital marketing strategies?
Multiple use-cases for B2C and B2B businesses to consider
If you’re a service provider in the B2B or B2C space, it’s likely that your digital marketing strategy outlines ways to:
- Generate new leads and win more business;
- Amplify your brand to increase market share; and
- Build and retain trust with your customers.
However, it shouldn’t just stop there… marketing teams are now increasingly partnering with HR teams to solve another problem.
Another emerging use case…
Increasingly, businesses are now leveraging social media advertising to attract new staff. In an economy running hot with unemployment levels at all-time lows, Aussie companies find themselves constrained by a skills and labour shortage.
Marketing teams are now increasingly partnering with HR teams to solve another problem.
Traditional recruitment strategies that rely on posting on job boards just doesn’t work as well as it used to… and for good reason! There just aren’t that many people actively searching for jobs in this heated market.
Progressive companies are already leveraging a highly effective playbook by using social media advertising to promote their employee value proposition to attract passive job seekers. This powerful form of advertising effectively works to ‘plant the seed’ and can ensure that your company is front of mind for passive job seekers.
How to: Cut through the noise for maximum results
Imagine this: You’re at home on a weeknight. It’s late in the evening. You’re relaxing on the lounge and scrolling on your phone. And right at that moment, you’re served an ad for something you were telling your partner about the other day. Boom! How convenient…
Snap back to reality. Now you’re a business owner, trying to figure out how to connect with the hearts and minds of your ideal target markets online. How can you deliver your advertising messages to them at the right time, in the right scroll stopping context?
How can you consistently generate positive ROI on your advertising investment without just throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks?
Here are 3 important considerations:
- Develop an intimate knowledge of your ideal target market. Build out your avatars and undertake some market research if it’s necessary to do so. Try to determine their level of market awareness. Are they problem aware? Or are they solution aware?
- Be clear on your objective. Do you want to generate leads? Or do you want to amplify your brand and drive traffic to raise awareness?
- Consider your call to action – what do you want your target market to do once they see your ads? It might be a great idea to have them click through to a well-constructed landing page that is congruent with your advertising messages. Or you might choose to simply drive all your paid advertising traffic to your website. Your call to action needs to align with your target market’s level of awareness for most effective results.
Meet your audience at their level of awareness…
Having an intimate knowledge of your ideal target market will allow you to understand where they sit on the ‘awareness scale’.
In his book, Breakthrough Advertising, Eugene Schwartz suggests different ways to reach your ideal target market at their level of awareness. Your advertising goal could be to simply move your target audience to their next level of awareness. For example, your advertising goal may be to connect with your target market in a problem awareness stage. Your offer could be a simple diagnostic to help them to breakthrough their problem and achieve more clarity on how to solve this problem. Carefully develop your advertising messaging and call to action to align with this goal.
Assisted business development for B2B companies
Social media paid advertising strategies for B2B companies can be tailored to assist offline business development activities. For example, your business development team would appreciate influential decision makers in your key target market to have previously heard of, or come across, your business before. These days, it takes up to 12-15 touch points with a brand for a consumer to consciously register an association with that brand.
One strategy we use effectively with our B2B clients is to position them as a point of authority in their field. Their advertising campaigns promote valuable publications to their key target market, allowing key decision makers to engage with this information. Consequently, it now becomes easier for your business development team to create a warmer introduction with your prospects, rather than attempting to create cold introductions with an unaware audience.
Winning results for our clients
Using our unique RAPID Methodology, it is our purpose to help businesses to connect with the hearts and minds of their ideal customers online, at scale and with lasting impact. We strive to provide our clients with the simplest and most compelling advertising playbook for achieving business outcomes, whether it be to achieve sustainable growth, attract new staff or to simply play a bigger game online.
We’ve helped home builders, property developers, dental clinics, and other high ticket service providers in the B2C and B2B space to generate over 10X ROI from their online advertising in 90 days or less.
Use our free calculator…
How many times have you run marketing campaigns and had zero idea the impact that it is having on your bottom line? Are you spending enough or not spending enough to achieve your goals?
Your total revenue generated from sales divided by your total marketing spend will give you the ROI over a given period.
If you’d like an easy way to plug and play your numbers, we’ve developed an Advertising ROI Calculator to make this easier for you.
If you know your numbers you can set achievable goals, and then continue to fine-tune and optimize as you work your way towards achieving your goals.
Click here to use our FREE Advertising ROI Calculator.
