The Characteristics of a Great Social Campaign

Social media is an invaluable marketing tool. It gives brands the ability to engage with consumers more effectively than anything else, while at the same time showcasing their values, products and personalities to build up an enthralling image. However, great social campaigns don't come about by chance.

The best social media work is meticulously planned and executed to perfection, which makes this kind of campaign difficult to jump into if you do not have a lot of experience. Luckily, it's definitely doable and something marketers should consider at the earliest opportunity. Here are our top tips for creating a great social campaign:

Decide what your objectives will be

Pixlee's Juliet Carnoy has plenty of experience running social media campaigns for brands, and her first task is always to decide on the goals of your campaign. If you know whether you're looking to build awareness, drive conversions or increase your number of followers, it will give you a much clearer idea of where to take your campaign.

If you're unsure what your objectives should be, Hootsuite recommends that the campaign goals "should be aligned with your broader marketing strategy, so that your social media efforts drive toward your business objectives". For this reason, you rarely see a great campaign that's solely based around generating likes or retweets; those are useful metrics of success, but they'll rarely line up with a brand's wider goals.

Use incentives wisely

Competitions are social media marketing 101. Offering users the chance to win a prize if they promote your brand can generally be seen as a good way to develop an audience. However, Social Media Examiner advises to "offer the right prize" if you want your campaign to be as effective as possible.

Avoid expensive prizes that have little or nothing to do with your brand, as these will cost you without really helping with promotion. In fact, they might harm it as fewer people will join in, thinking that they have less chance of winning an expensive prize. Instead, opt for something unique to your brand if possible, such as your particular service or product. This will advertise what you have to offer while still adding value to the user.

Utilize multiple channels

Social media is just one of the many tools that can help your campaigns, so you shouldn't restrict yourself. In fact, broadening your reach across a variety of marketing techniques will only serve to boost your results on social media.

For example, you could create some content designed to target organic search, with the aim of funneling users to your brand's social media pages to keep them engaged. MarketingLand points out: