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Dealers Experience 53% Faster Social Fan Growth
The Challenge
Oftentimes small retailers and dealerships have little or no budget for a dedicated social media manager. Finding and creating compelling content on a consistent basis puts a burden on sales managers and staff and frequently is one of the last things a retailer thinks about when running day-to-day operations at their store.
On the other hand, social media benefits are well-documented and touted as a way to drive more visibility and more sales for a retailer. Social media allows retailers to talk directly to customers and followers and helps build credibility and top-of-mind awareness; more than 40% of digital consumers use social networks to research new brands or products. A big component of social discovery is letting your consumers know who you are as a business and what you stand for.
And it’s not just about putting the posts out there, it’s about creating compelling, visual content that makes consumers stop their scrolling and pay attention. While a great image can be compelling for a social scroller, a great video generates twice the number of clicks. But for a small business, creating great photos or videos for social is oftentimes cost-prohibitive; outsourcing marketing video production costs can range anywhere from $1,200 for a basic video, to $50,000 for a premium video.
Between hard costs and time costs, social media content is often neglected by the very businesses that would see the greatest impact for that content.
The Solution
Retailers who onboard with ThumbStopper have high-quality, engaging content automatically fed to their business’s social page on a consistent cadence.
Most retailers on ThumbStopper receive product or brand specific assets twice a week, with the brands they sell curating the images or videos, as well as the post text.
The ability for small retailers to rely on their brands to assist them without any need for intervention from the retailer ensures that only the most engaging content is posted by the retailer.
What’s more, ThumbStopper’s patented AI enables content to be syndicated out to retailers on different times and days, ensuring social algorithms don’t penalize the content as spammy or artificial.
Between hard costs and time costs, social media content is often neglected by the very businesses that would see the greatest impact for that content.
The Results
ThumbStopper analyzed social media insights for a set of small business retailers and looked at their social insights over a six month period immediately before and immediately after implementing ThumbStopper’s Brand Manager for their social content syndication.
Of the retailers evaluated, here were the results:
Post volume increased by 110%, from an average of 97 posts per period to an average of 202 posts per period
Prior to onboarding with ThumbStopper, the dealers surveyed had an average of 97 posts over a 6 month period. This is likely due the fact that producing social content is time-consuming and costly.
Once on ThumbStopper, these dealers immediately received consistently released, high-quality organic content to their social feeds, upping their post volume to an average of 202 posts over a 6 month period.
Post impressions increased 72%, from an average of 112,318 organic impressions per period to an average of 192,738 organic impressions per period
Social algorithms like Facebook award more organic visibility to pages that post consistently and that post content that gets engagements. Because the surveyed dealers began not only posting more content but also posting native, organic content on a consistent basis, organic post impressions increased period over period.
Fan growth increased by 53%, from a growth rate of 6.4% per period to 9.8% per period
Most notably in the survey, dealers saw a drastic increase in the rate at which they accumulated fans and followers to their pages. In the 6 month period before ThumbStopper, dealers experienced a fan growth rate of 6.4%, on average. In the six month period immediately following, after onboarding with ThumbStopper, dealers saw a growth rate in new fans and followers of 9.8%. The additional fans and followers also contributes to the growth in organic impressions seen by the dealers, period over period.
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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.