Facebook, Twitter, and Companies... OH MY!

By: Justin Mertes-Mistretta, Media Strategy Intern

If you are reading this it is highly likely that you are either a Facebook user or a frequent blog reader.  Either way, social media is nothing new to you.  But for many companies, social media is a new way to deliver brand messages and start discussions with a broader audience. 

These trends have become apparent to me while working on the Wrigley account as an intern this summer. All of our brands and competitor’s brands have a Facebook and Twitter page and link those pages to their YouTube channel and other digital media. 

After doing extensive competitor research, I ran across Mentos’ social media campaign, which I found to be very interesting. 

On their Facebook brand page, they have their brand character, Dragee, on the front of the page. Dragee promotes living positive minded and does so with Mentos. Now, with social media, Dragee is able to interact with millions of users with his digital shorts on YouTube and Facebook/Twitter posts. 

Virtually anything on Facebook can be “liked” and corporations have used this to promote their brands. There are over 65 million pages that get “liked” each day and Coca-Cola is the top company in terms of “likes” with over 32 million. 

Research has shown that people who “like” pages are more likely to recommend the brand to their friends and are also more likely to purchase the brand themselves. 

A great example of this is Dentyne’s Facebook page, where they ask you to “like” Dentyne. If you do so, you are allowed to join the “Safe Breath Alliance,” where you can see FAQs about Safe Breath. 

And then of course there is Twitter, the second largest social media vehicle, used by 65 percent of the Fortune Global 100. Approximately three million companies have Twitter accounts and average 1,489 followers. 

With over 175 million users on Twitter, companies are able to communicate with their fans multiple times in a day. #TGIF is no longer the only reoccurring trending topic.  Companies often times become trending topics too.  NBC’s new singing show, The Voice, had several mentions during their live shows when the artists and their songs became trending topics.  

Companies also use characters in their Twitter accounts to grab the attention of consumers. An example of this is Stride and the “Ram” (Stride mascot). Their tweets are from the “Ram’s” perspective and promote events and other sponsors, such as Major League Gaming, which is the largest organized league for professional video gaming. 

 

Social media is only growing, especially top sites like Facebook, which has seen a 2,440 percent increase in ad spend. This number is expected to grow through 2015, according to Socialbakers.

By the end of July 2012, it is predicted that one out of every seven people in the world will be a Facebook user. 

With numbers like that it only makes sense that companies would use social media to reach consumers and promote their brand.

Here at Starcom we use digital and social media outlets as one of our main avenues in our media plans.  The virtual world of social media has become our reality in a sense. Consumers spend the majority of their time in a digital space and successful advertisers are the ones who reciprocate those actions.

FACTS:

• According to Burson-Marsteller, approximately 80 percent of Fortune 100 companies are using at least one of the top social media platforms to engage with stakeholders.
• There are more than twice as many people on Facebook (700 million) than there are in the United States, and of all the websites visited in June 2011, 38 percent of the traffic was on Facebook, according to a study done by emarketer. 
• According to GlobalWebIndex, the main reason people follow brands on social media is to receive discounts for future purchases (60 percent do this).
• Slightly less than 47 percent of consumers said they visit pages for customer service and 26 percent had no particular reason.
• Some other reasons people may follow a brand page includes insight, tracking delivery, purchasing, discussion, competitions and access to new products prior to release.
• Every second, there are nearly eight new accounts added to Facebook. According to Nielson, Twitter is also growing an unprecedented annual rate of 2,565 percent, which makes it the fastest growing social network.