Key Points:
Social media has completely changed how brands communicate with and advertise to their customers. Brands have their own social media pages and recognize the importance of being active on them, especially on their target demographic’s favorite platforms. But how can they get their content on third-party pages and social media destinations?
They might have ventured into influencer marketing and discovered that the most lucrative partnerships are often with micro-influencers. TikTok’s explosion in popularity and the following rise of short-form video have prompted brands to adapt to that medium as well.
Adopting current trends has proven to be an effective strategy for brands to remain relevant in the minds of consumers. However, it’s important to note that even though following trends provides a short-term return on investment, the practice isn’t immune to diminishing returns. Influencing is a prime example: it’s still effective, but consumers don’t trust macro-influencers as readily as they did when the concept was new. Social media is always evolving so in the short run, it’s not clear what’s a short-lived trend and what will become a mainstay of the medium.
Regardless of the direction that social platforms go in, savvy brand marketers will continue looking for permanent solutions to improve their marketing metrics. That’s where your retailer network comes in. Discover how your brand can tap into its social destinations and reach an audience at the local level:
Partnering with independent retailers isn’t a new idea – there are countless iterations of co-op marketing programs, some of which your brand may have already tried. Social media marketing programs most likely utilize digital asset management software (DAMs). In theory, it works like this: brands create social media content and upload it to the DAM. Then they help retailers create accounts, log into the system, and download social content. Retailers then create posts and add captions on their own social accounts.
But from the retailer’s perspective, this approach is cumbersome and often ignored.
Retailers understand the importance of social media. They see the value in collaborating with brands to drive sales by posting branded content to their social pages. They also know that managing their social presence comes second to their primary job of running their business.
DAMs require that retailers do every step of social media marketing except creating content. And while retailers undoubtedly struggle with that (even large brands have to invest a lot of time and money in content creation) simply creating content for retailer use isn’t enough to make the effort worth it. But the biggest obstacle is scheduling or manually publishing content. Considering the volume of content they’ll want to publish, this task can quickly become far too time-consuming for the average retailer. Brands risk alienating their retail partners by asking for too much of their time.
When brand co-op marketing efforts require extra effort on their part (taking away precious time from managing their retail location) retailers are less likely to participate and won’t see the benefits of such programs.
For brands, the benefit of successful co-op marketing is obvious. It enables brands to organically reach a larger audience than they normally would’ve through brand-owned channels, namely out-of-market (or future) customers. That extra engagement can lead to an increase in devoted, long-term followers, instead of the temporary and costly spike that may come from strategies such as partnering with macro-influencers.
But when brands pursue content distribution with DAMs, there’s more to worry about beyond unsatisfactory enrollment. Even when retailers are willing to use DAMs, brands still have trouble ensuring that the right content is being published. Retailers on opposite sides of the globe shouldn’t be posting the exact same content. From language differences and cultural considerations to seasonal weather affecting what products people are looking for, brands need to consider and address what their niche audiences want to see from them. Controlling which locations receive (or don’t receive) specific content when your brand has thousands of retailers and a huge library of digital assets is a nearly impossible task. Brands need a software solution that gives them full control over scalable content distribution that also makes social media simpler for retailers.
ThumbStopper’s proprietary software connects brands to retailers’ social pages and does the heavy lifting for you.
Here’s how it works:
The social media experts at ThumbStopper reach out to your independent retailers with brand-approved enrollment materials. Our customer success team works with retailers to complete enrollment and connect their social pages to ThumbStopper. Once retailers are connected, brands can start disseminating content. Our software makes it easy for brands to organize large folders of content and dictate which retail locations receive what content. Even better, instead of waiting for retailers to download content as they would with a DAM, ThumbStopper enables brands to schedule and automatically post content to retailers’ pages. The social media experts at ThumbStopper reach out to your independent retailers with brand-approved enrollment materials. Our customer success team works with retailers to complete enrollment and connect their social pages to ThumbStopper. Once retailers are connected, brands can start disseminating content. Our software makes it easy for brands to organize large folders of content and dictate which retail locations receive what content. Even better, instead of waiting for retailers to download content as they would with a DAM, ThumbStopper enables brands to schedule and automatically post content to retailers’ pages.
Retailers benefit by gaining a larger following and increased engagement through branded content with little effort on their part. They get to maintain control over social accounts while also enjoying beneficial social algorithms built into our program. In addition, brands that promote their products through retailers help drive sales.
For brands, the advantages of hyper-localizing social media marketing efforts can’t be overstated. For example, an outdoor power equipment brand that partnered with ThumbStopper saw a 364% increase in combined organic reach after their retailers were enrolled and began receiving content. Furthermore, providing content for retailers ensures that your brand’s image stays consistent as opposed to competing with off-brand retailer-created content.
In short, ThumbStopper removes the biggest barriers to successful social media co-op marketing – relieving the burden of creating/scheduling posts from retailers and empowering brands to enroll retailers easily.
Ready to see what ThumbStopper can do for your brand? Book a demo to learn more.