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Dealer-Level Social Content Posting-Frequency Increases Over 300% with ThumbStopper®
Dealer-Level Social Content Posting Frequency Increases Over 300% with ThumbStopper®
In 2019, a premier luxury SUV brand wanted to celebrate a major anniversary.
The Challenge
At the corporate level, the brand was doing a great job leveraging their high-quality marketing assets on their own social pages, however, they faced several challenges in distributing their content across their network of independent dealers’ social media pages.
For starters, creating a central hub where dealers could access the marketing resources was possible, but like many brands, they faced a challenge in getting their independent dealers to comply with their marketing request. The primary aspect of their challenge lay in the fact that many of their independent dealerships had either no marketing department, an agency that handled their marketing on their behalf–with tight budgets and marketing plans already in place–or a single staff member who “moonlighted” as their marketing department, in concert with their primary job functions. The barrier of connectivity to their dealers’ social pages meant that they had to rely on their dealers finding time to log in, download the assets, and post on their social pages.
Their Solution
With an overall goal of increasing brand awareness during their milestone anniversary, the brand looked to build a dealer portal to store and provide to their dealers the curated user generated content. The content was curated and stored in a portal, with the hope that their dealers would actively navigate to the portal, log in, search for appropriate content, and share it on their social pages on a regular cadence.
Their Results
Though the brand tried to simplify the process for their dealers as much as they could, because dealers had to initiate the process, poor results from the campaign were seen. Out of their 173 North American dealers, only 43 of their dealers followed the process and posted the anniversary UGC. Moreover, of the 43 who posted content, many only posted once. There was very little posting frequency which led to many marketing assets never being posted.
Enter ThumbStopper
With ThumbStopper, 100% of participating dealers have content posted to their social media pages on a regular frequency, often times twice per week. Our patented automation software ensures every dealer receives high-quality brand-created content, with frequency and timing controlled at the brand level.
Segmentation
What’s more, content is easily segmented so that dealers only receive content and promotions for the products they sell. Brands on the ThumbStopper platform simply tag the content with the appropriate region, product, or language. Dealers with matching tags receive the content automatically.
Syndication
In line with social platform algorithm best practices, the same piece of content is never syndicated to dealers at the same time on the same day. Using ThumbStopper’s patented AI solution in our Brand Manager™ software, brand-approved content is disseminated so that no two dealers receive the same content on the same day at the same time. This ensures that social media algorithms don’t view the content as “spammy” or “automated”, which affects the organic reach platforms like Instagram and Facebook are willing to give to the content. Higher reach means more eyes on brand content that is pushed natively through to the local dealers’ social pages.
Adoption
To ensure brand-to-dealer connectivity, ThumbStopper proactively reaches out to a brand’s entire retail network, handling the connection process. Our team of Brand Concierges request access to each dealer’s social page, and walk them through the easy process of accepting our request. Once the connection is complete, content automatically flows from the brand to the dealer’s’ social pages via the ThumbStopper Brand Manager. Dealers never have to learn any new software, remember a log in, or choose, schedule, edit, or post content from the brand again.
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Key Points:
- Companies should understand the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) to ensure their websites are accessible.
- Brands that concentrate on accessibility on social media demonstrate care for their customers and build a positive brand reputation.
- Brands should always consider inclusive design, such as plain, straightforward language, in their social media posts.
Accessibility may not be a term you usually associate with the internet and social media. You might picture wheelchair ramps, directional signs in braille, or sign language interpreters at live performances. The landmark Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 dictates the legal necessity of these and similar accommodations in public spaces. As we’ve come to rely on the internet for everything from entertainment to buying groceries, it’s become clear that the internet is now also a public space. It must be accessible to everyone. And like other applications of ADA, businesses that do not comply are liable for damages caused by inaccessibility.
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are an international set of standards to provide instruction on meeting accessibility needs. It’s important for companies to understand how this applies to their websites, especially if they engage in e-commerce. In terms of social media, the requirements are less concrete. But prioritizing accessibility on your company’s social media is essential to your reputation, even if the legal requirements are uncertain. We’ll look at why it’s important to your customers, how it affects the perception of your brand, and how to make these changes efficiently.
Social Media for All
The cornerstone of accessibility is inclusive design: products or experiences that are accessible for everyone regardless of disability. The most important place where this shows up is on company websites where most users expect to also find links to the brand’s social media profiles. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of websites are not accessible, despite the fact that the application of ADA to the internet is over 20 years old. Making websites accessible is a complex process without the use of specialized software like Accessibe or EqualWeb.
Unlike websites, making sure your social media is accessible is a straightforward, ongoing process. Every social platform has been quick to release optional accessibility features. These features are important to many users even if they don’t rely on them to use social media.
Making your social presence accessible tells users that your brand cares about people, not just profits. It’s the same idea as the push for the representation of different body sizes in fashion or more expansive skin tone ranges in beauty products. Brands that meet the needs of underrepresented groups endear themselves to others as well. And while optimizing your brand website for accessibility might be a larger project you aren’t ready to tackle yet, starting with your social media pages is a great way to show customers that you’re listening to their concerns.
Making Content Accessible
Shifting to accessible content means incorporating inclusive design into your creative process. The practice varies by type of media. For platforms that have graphics or videos with captions, it means not only adjusting each component but also being mindful of how they interact with each other.
For example, YouTube’s automatically generated closed captions and subtitles are often inaccurate. It's one of many examples where the caption generation software has issues picking up strong accents and mumbled words. This could be remedied with handcrafted video transcription services. If that’s not in the budget, the video creator could add their script or transcription to the video description.
None of the technology for accessibility is perfect yet. Teaching computers to digest complex information for human understanding is difficult, and the variations in disabilities further complicate it. The majority of adjustments creators need to make revolve around helping assistive technology better understand their content. Let’s look at how to make different kinds of content accessible.
Text
- Use plain language that’s easy to understand
- Avoid text in all caps
- Capitalize the first letter of each word in a hashtag, like #SocialMediaMarketing, a practice called camel-case
Videos
- Provide descriptive captions. Instead of just displaying the words people on-screen say, explain background noises and other sounds that are relevant to the scene.
- Add your own subtitles or enable auto-subtitles on the video platform of your choice
- Use captioning for live videos when possible
Graphics
- Use color contrast checkers to make sure low-vision people can see images
- Try not to completely rely on color to show contrast
- Add alternative text on each social platform
Distribute Accessible Content
Many users find their new favorite brand through social media. When disabled people (who make up 26% of the population according to the CDC) can’t access your brand’s social posts, you miss the opportunity to connect with a demographic that’s eager to engage in online communities. On a hyper-local level, that kind of connection goes even further.
That’s why ThumbStopper exists to help brands distribute their social content to their retailer network. Retailers can connect with their local audience - with your accessible, branded content - in a more personal way. And since content goes to their page automatically once they sign up, retailers can effortlessly promote your brand online while focusing on running their business.
Ready to see how ThumbStopper can help your brand improve its reach? Check out our brand reach calculator or book a demo.