Using paid advertising options on social media enables brands to amplify their audience reach and drive greater business results. Paid social media marketing is not just about driving sales—it can be used to build a more effective customer journey, especially during the pandemic when so many users are relying on eCommerce and digital platforms to gather information and make purchases.
In today’s article, we’ll be interviewing Spark Growth’s account manager, Julia Pyo, to give us more insight on what paid social media marketing is and why it’s so important for brands to be strategic in their approach.
Thanks for joining us today, Julia! First, can you tell us a bit about your role at Spark Growth?
Absolutely. I’m an account manager here, meaning my main job is to be a liaison between our clients and our team. A big part of that involves interpreting the clients’ needs to the team, and also explaining the work that we do in beginner-friendly terms to the client.
In order to properly break down the components of our work to the client, it’s also my job to understand how all the different aspects of our project actually function: for example, graphic design, copywriting, and paid social media analytics.
Can you briefly tell us what “paid social media” means?
Paid social media is basically just a different way of saying social media ads. If you’re paying the social media platform to post or boost content, then it’s “paid” social media. The most popular platforms for these are, of course, the most popular social media platforms. For instance, Facebook Ads, Instagram for Business, YouTube Ads, and Snapchat Ads.
On the other hand, “organic” social media content is any social media content that is not paid for. These are usually the types of content people usually think of when they think of a typical social media post.
Why is it important for brands to have a paid social media presence alongside an organic one?
Paid social media is a great way to grow your social presence and brand image. With social media networks purposely deprioritizing content from brands in their feeds, it can be difficult to grow your digital presence using organic social media alone.
By paying the platform, you can guarantee that at least some people, and hopefully the most relevant ones, are seeing it. It’s a win-win-win: the user is happy to see more relevant content (assuming your targeting is reasonably accurate), the social platform is happy that you’re using it, and your business gets more guaranteed exposure to a targeted audience.
Why is it important to prioritize “strategy” when it comes to paid advertising?
Most platforms allow brands to create and test ad campaigns that are tailored to users based on age, interest, and demographics. With so many different options and combinations of options, it can be hard to choose the best ones to target your audience. You’re putting real dollars into this, so to make sure you’re getting the most bang for your buck, it’s incredibly valuable to do necessary research and to come up with a concrete strategy to take the most advantage of what each platform can offer.
Lastly, why is it valuable for businesses to choose social media as a primary channel to invest ad spend?
The most obvious answer at the time that I’m writing this, which is towards the end of 2020, is of course the current ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. With everyone at home, digital marketing and social media advertising has surged in popularity and in usage simply due to a lack of other options.
Even prior to this period of social distancing though, social media marketing has experienced exponential growth in the last few years. The platforms themselves have surged in popularity and users have become more comfortable with online payments. These social media platforms offer more affordable options for small businesses to market themselves compared to traditional media. Social media marketing has become most brands’ go-to way to increase their brand awareness, bring in traffic to their website, generate leads, and drive sales.
Thanks for joining us today, Julia, and offering your insights about the importance of paid social media!
Paid social media has been an incredibly valuable tool to drive business goals in recent years and more businesses are using social media in order to prepare for 2021. Brands can use paid and organic social media simultaneously to build a robust and strategic online presence. Using them together fills in the gaps that one or the other can’t necessarily accomplish alone in order to take advantage of all the benefits of social media marketing.
Here’s an example of how a paid social media program can help a brand achieve its business goals. At Spark Growth, our client Little Kickers needed a marketing strategy that shifted focus from brand awareness to driving sales. After implementing a paid ad program for them, we helped Little Kickers achieve a 341% increase in website purchases! If you’re interested in learning more, read the full case study below!
href="#" data-color-override="false" data-hover-color-override="false" data-hover-text-color-override="#fff">Click here to read our Little Kickers case study!