Olivia Atkinson
There are many social media tips, tricks and tactics to ensure your content gets shared and eventually goes ‘viral’. Through producing content for social media, its ultimately every businesses goal for that content to be seen by as many people as possible.
Other than paying for exposure through paid ads or magazine and directories, the only other way your content will get shared is if it’s great.
What one person might perceive as great might be boring and un-engaging to another. This is why we’re going to take a deeper look into the reasons behind why people share content.
We will then outline what you can be doing to improve the content you create for social media.
The American Marketing Association has carried out multiple experiments with studies to test hypothesis on why people share video ads on social media.
Below is a selection of the findings and how this could affect your building product brand's online tactics.
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People Are More Likely To Share New Products Or Services
Although this sounds obvious, the reason why might not be what you think. People like to share content that they think will be useful to others but there are also a few other reasons.
New products are attractive, shiny and modern so it makes sense why they create a buzz.
However to the advantage of the building products industry people are also likely to share content when the purchase risk is high or the product or service has a high price tag.
Consumers are generally more attentive and receptive to information about a high priced products or services, they process information deeply to minimise purchase risk.
This is huge for the building products industry as contractors, architects and specifiers don’t want to provide a poor service. If they pick a company that doesn’t pull through it reflects badly on them.
Case studies and testimonials are great to use on social media to eliminate any doubts that your company can’t deliver.
Launching A New Product Or Service
The reason people share information on new products or services is because new products are a risk. By sharing information they’re giving others the opportunity to comment or question the technicalities of the product or service.
People also share content on new products when they’re more knowledgeable about the specific market, it enhances their reputation as being an opinion leader.
Another reason people share new product information is for personal gain, as others may help the sharer by sharing similar content about new products they’ve discovered.
It also makes people feel like they are part of a community. By sharing information about new products they are with like-minded others. It also gives them the opportunity to express their uniqueness by showing what products they’ve found.
People Share Content That Arouses Positive Emotion Over Negative Emotion
Again this sounds so obvious, but there’s a deeper understanding to it. After just discovering that people normally share content for personal gain, the same is reflected here.
If someone keeps sharing negative posts that evoke fear and sadness, their followers will feel negative when viewing shared content which may lead to an unfollow.
Positive emotions are key to socialising motivations for sharing. Adverts that create positive emotions such as excitement, joy, inspiration and pride make viewers feel good, which induces a positive mood.
People then feel positive towards the sharer as they've made them feel happy, enhancing the sharers opportunity for self-enhancement in the present and reciprocity by the recipient in the future.
Receivers are likely to feel more positively inclined towards socialising with those who make them feel good.
How does this all relate to the building products industry?
Some advertising methods include tactics such as shock or even scare. The only problem with this is its creating a negative emotion.
Think about your product specifically – do you use things such as regulations, health and safety and historic bad examples to make your product look better?
If so, try flipping it on its head and present the recipient with the positive benefits first, and how your product helps. This will create a positive emotion rather than a negative one.
High Levels Of Brand Prominence In Ads Negatively Impacts Sharing
Videos are a great way of presenting content and demonstrating features of your product or service. However too much branding can actually have a negative effect on your advert.
Advertisers often want they’re brand name to be quite prominent in the video to create awareness so that people remember them.
Yet prominent brand names can also trigger thoughts about the advertiser and their commercial motives. Such a process can make consumers resistant to the message.
By interrupting the consumers abilities to engage with the plot of the video and the ad’s ability to arouse emotion you're interfering with peoples inclination to share.
This is something we can all relate to, think about TV adverts at Christmas time.
The big brands like John Lewis and Sainsbury’s don’t reveal their brand name till the very end. This allows you to fully engage in the story, the plot and process the message.
It then finishes with only the brand logo on the screen, giving you enough time to link the company to the heart warming story you’ve just watched that’s made you feel an assortment of positive emotions.
If there was a constant reminder of the brand throughout you would lose focus and get frustrated that you can't fully engage in the story without being interrupted.
Conclusion
Although the report related to video ad sharing, a lot of it resonates and makes sense to all online content and sharing on social media.
It’s a good idea to think about your own habits when on a social media platform, what makes you want to share something, what emotions were you feeling and why did you share it, for your benefit or for others?
This report aligns with the inbound methodology of being helpful and educating your audience. So many companies are guilty of talking about themselves, and how great their company is. Instead you should be talking about your product or service as a solution to peoples problem.
This way the recipient can resonate and relate to your message rather than feeling like they’re constantly being sold to.
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About Insynth
As the only HubSpot certified agency to major on construction marketing, we bring together construction marketing strategy, digital strategy, website design, SEO, content marketing, email marketing, sales automation, marketing automation and HubSpot CRM implementation to produce successful campaigns and great results for our clients.