Media Playground: Social media – ‘you have to keep talking’

Speaking at MediaTel Group’s Media Playground event today Paul Wright, chief digital officer at OMD UK, said that big brands are now well past the test phase with social media and that we are all seeing better activity because of it. He believes that there are still some inhibitors, the major one being that the advertising platform changes so frequently.

The Social Media session started with the SABR research findings from Millward Brown investigating the effectiveness of different media channels for brand campaigns as well as direct response. The results showed that although TV performed well, it was Facebook that achieved a higher ROI than any other channel in the study.

A key theme from the discussion was that you shouldn’t deliver social in short bursts with no activity in-between. Phil Townend, MD of Unruly Media, said: “If you stop talking to your friends on Facebook you’re not being a good mate, the same applies to brands – you have to keep talking to be credible.”

Townend cited Nike as a company that is “very good” at creating emotionally engaging video content that is genuine and works very well in the social space. However, Wright added that activity 365 days a year isn’t necessarily going to be possible for all brands because of the resource and cost involved.

The panel agreed that creating content that your audience then shares with a friend is a massive campaign amplifier. The added credibility of content suggested by a peer causes a significant uplift in metrics like Intent to Purchase.