Native Advertising: Does It Work?

For as long as I remember, (and that’s a long time) the idea of an ad was to cut through the clutter and stand out. Now they want to blend in.

Move over banner ads, the newest way to attract attention to your product or service is to be indistinguishable from the surrounding environment. It’s called Native Advertising, and at its most persuasive when it’s barely noticeable as an ad. (Hello, neuroscience…). We’ve all seen them. Sponsored posts found on social media and editorial websites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Buzzfeed, Forbes and Business Insider are all forms of Native Advertising.

For example, on Facebook one may see a status update or picture on their newsfeed from a company. Other examples gaining popularity are posts replicating the content of a Buzzfeed post. Companies are creating their own lists, aka “listicles”, or how to’s, and promoting them on the Buzzfeed page. But the trickiest are those found on editorial sites, like the UPS sponsored ad shown here.

Source: Cpcstrategy.com

Sponsored content can be easily mistaken for an article. All of these, however, state in the ad that it is a ‘sponsored post’ or ‘promoted by’, but their context mimics that of the site it’s posted on.

Source: Copyblogger.com

Believe it or not, native advertising does work, and here is why: people are pulling the content they want to read and social media has become a reliable friend (replacing real reliable friends in some cases, but that’s another story.) It can be argued that ads that blend into the user-selected formats (as in the case of UPS) are less intrusive and less likely a distraction users tune out. In this case, UPS would probably argue that they are provided valuable content in line with the content Business Insider users want.

Research indicates that consumers view native ads 52% more than banner ads. The same study also states that native ads, because they are served to the consumer based on the consumer’s online behavior and interests, are more likely to be shared with a friend or family member. Isn’t a tweet or instagram post from a familiar company on your news page a little less aggressive and a lot more interesting? Many, including me, would say no, but since so much of our decision-making is, to quote, Dan Ariely, “predictably irrational” what we think or say is not necessarily how we feel or act.

How to write effectively for social media

Social media is like this giant game that everyone plays, few master and most fail to win. Generally, people may struggle to get their ideas across in the short character limits of Twitter or have to actively attempt not to ramble on in a Facebook post.

Content-wise, the creation of quality content all stems from the Golden Rule of social media that all marketers, and even people eager to better their personal brand, should know.

The Golden Rule is this, all content should aim to do one, or more, of four things: entertain, expose, engage and/or educate. Following the rules of the four E’s will allow you to think about the content you are posting and help you to measure if it is valuable content.

We, as consumers, are selfish. We don’t want to click, comment, like or even see an ad, post or tweet that isn’t relevant to us on some level or one that doesn’t “offer” up anything for us in return. That’s what the four E’s do – they quantify that return.

If the post is for entertainment, someone may get a chuckle out of it or a story to tell his or her friend later. For expose and educate, people are offered up the opportunity to learn something – even if they don’t know they are doing it. For engage, everyone loves to hear him or herself speak – they just want a soapbox to stand on. By giving someone that opportunity, and if it’s something they feel worthy of engaging with, your content becomes valuable. With the same notion, people also do not want you to just talk all about yourself on social media – you need to ask something of them in return.

Another effective tool to keep in mind when writing and creating content for social media, is to keep your mind focused on creating a consistent voice for your product, your social media outlets. Think about who you are talking to, what you are saying and how you are saying it. This may vary from platform to platform or vary by content itself, but before you send any tweet or press that “post” button as yourself, who is this valuable to and what kind of message am I sending?

In conclusion, there are many different ways to create valuable content for your followers – but by sticking to content that will not only give your consumers something in return, but will ask something of them, you are making them want to come back and continue to engage with your brand.

AP Style rules most PR folk don’t know

As a vibrant member of the journalist turned PR (semi-quasi-trying to be) professional, I know a thing or two about AP Style. Whether it was through my cutthroat journalism program at the University of Florida or during my reporting days at Newsweek and The Daily Beast, I had that wonderful, yet frustratingly ever-changing, AP Stylebook figuratively beaten over my head many times.

Now, transitioning into the public relations universe I’ll find myself muttering at my desk every so often about how “email” is not hyphenated or how dumpster USED to be capitalized (ever-changing, I told you). It’s both a blessing and a curse, but now I’d like to share my curse with you and I’d like to go beyond the lack of serial commas, proper time and date format (Nov. 4 at 3 p.m. FYI) and how you should really stop trying to make Facebook two words.

So, I present to you, 5 AP Style rules you may not know

• Food is just weird
Always look up all foods. Why? Get ready for these. The “Foster” and “Wellington” in bananas Foster and beef Wellington are both capitalized. Hyphenate bread-and-butter pickles. Capitalize “Brie” in all uses. It’s “Brussels sprouts.” It’s Champagne, but then it’s also chardonnay. Is my point clear yet? Always look it up. Some of them have some really interesting reasons behind why they are they way they, well, are, too.

• It’s chairman and chairwoman and never chairperson.
The same applies to spokeswoman and spokesman. It’s never spokesperson. If you do not know the gender of the person, use the word representative. For chairman or chairwoman, never just shorten to chair, either, unless that is the organizations official title for the person.

• All of those stores
This is something that can be solved most of the time with a simple Google search if you don’t have the time to whip out your handy AP Stylebook. People, in speaking, have a tendency to make everything plural or possessive and say “Nordstrom’s” instead of simply “Nordstrom.” Here are some quick hits: Gap Inc., Tiffany & Co., Macy’s Inc., Neiman Marcus Inc., Saks Fifth Avenue Inc. and Barneys New York. Also, just while we are on the subject. It’s T-shirt. Not tshirt, t-Shirt or any other millions of ways I’ve seen flying around out there.

• Hyphens are confusing. Do not trust them.
If you ever think something could be hyphenated, please check it out. If you think it couldn’t be hyphenated, hey, still check it out. Cellphone, for instance, is one word. I’ve seen it hyphened or more often it’s two words. Carry-on? Hyphenated. 7-Eleven? (The store kind not the Beyoncé kind) Hyphenated.

• Internet is still capitalized
Why? Don’t ask me. But it is.

Bonus tips? Towards and amongst are not words. Please stop using them. Also, take the time to learn the difference between podium and lectern. A podium is not what you think it is.

I am sure I don’t have to tell you why it’s so important to follow AP Style as best as you can. In the past, when I’d receive a pitch from a public relations professional, before I was one, if I saw even one part of the release that wasn’t in AP Style I’d be a little miffed. It’s much easier to sell perfection to someone, even if they aren’t looking for it, than something they have to spend hours fixing.

So get it right the first time, go the extra mile and all of the other cliché “go above and beyond” sayings there are out there. This could be the difference between getting your story placed and getting it sent to the spam folder.

For the love of Beyoncé, please stop using hashtags on Facebook

So unless you’ve been in some sort of astronaut space sleep / coma for an extended period of time, we have this thing called a hashtag now. My father, for instance, still likes to pronounce it as “pound.” I am pound blessed to have a father like him.

It’s peculiar, yet extremely useful in some ways for PR professionals and advertisers. It has, in many ways, even lost it’s meaning as we see a simple photo of, let’s say, a sunset. Said sunset is then captioned with the following (and this is an actual example from someone who shant be named): #sun #set #orange #yellow #colors #livinlife #blessed #fridaynight #chillen #drinkingmargs #notreally #drinkingmojitos #beach #sand #fun #family #friends #summer #notreallysummersnothereyet #eatingmyfaceoff #conchfritters #beautiful #beauty

There’s more. I just couldn’t bring myself to physically type them all.

If you are totally lost, a hashtag is a way to index a subject a user is referring to so that it can be accessed by other users and sorted into that specific category. No spaces are required for hashtags and no punctuation is needed. These will often be used for special events. For instance, you’ll see the Super Bowl come out with a specific hashtag or you’ll see an ad campaign launch nudging people to use the hashtag. You’ll want to be specific when using hashtags as well. For instance #family isn’t a particularly effective hashtag because it is too broad. #TheAdamsFamily or #FamilyFeud? You’re getting there.

Hashtags are in full force on Twitter and Instagram, and besides for the aforementioned problem of the overuse, they are looking pretty solid.

So then comes the black sheep of hashtags yet the Golden Goose of the social media world: Facebook.

Use them? Don’t use them? You’ll never get a straight answer on this debate. My advice for other marketers out there, and for people interested in self-branding, is to not use them.

They can make your post clunky and they aren’t particularly effective on Facebook even with the security settings of everyone’s profiles being a dime a dozen for what they are and aren’t showing. Hashtags, sure, can make your content visible to a wide audience, but Facebook, at this point, is like the stuffed animal you had in fifth grade. Yeah, you kind of still have it way past its due date, but it holds a bunch of memories, is somewhat sad to get rid of and (circa my photos from 2009) is really, really embarrassing to show to your friends.

As the dying modem for conversation among young people, what’s the point in trying to create more engagement with hashtags? Some may disagree, but I stand by my point.
In a study of top brands on social media by SproutSocial, interactions dropped abruptly for brands using three to five hashtags in a post – and fell steeply from that for each hashtag there after.

Now in some cases, Facebook campaigns with hashtags can be extremely successful, but that is mostly when those hashtags are taken cross-platform. For instance, the Dove #Beautyis campaign was a very widely used (and brilliant might I add) campaign. They’ve since moved the to #speakbeautiful where women are encouraged to say something nice about themselves every day, whether through a photo or just a simple tweet.

I’d also like to bring exhibit B to your attention: top-branded news(?) outlets like Mashable, Buzzfeed and The Daily Beast. You will rarely, if ever in extreme cases like events or a specific campaign, see those outlets use hashtags on their Facebook pages. It’s a link and a quick pull quote or just something to grab your eye. That’s what the secret formula is now-adays.

Go forth and use your hashtags on Instagram and Twitter, just please, keep them out of my Facebook that I don’t even check.

Hang on there a minute, little company.

The headline for this recent article in AdAge “Living Proof That Small Brands Can Make the Big Time” bit.ly/1WaP8ul makes it sound like this tiny company made it big on all its little own. But let’s be real, any little cosmetic company that has Jennifer Aniston as its spokesperson is going to take off like a rocket ship. This was an enormous investment for the company, and while the equity stake may be unusual, it is most certainly projected to be richly rewarding for Aniston. So while I say, good for Living Proof, it’s not like they “made it in the big time” on a dime.

Gap…After All These Years, You’ve Finally Come Back To Me.

At long last, the Gap has woken from its 20 year slumber. When the Gap started in 1969 they were all about blue jeans and great white T-shirts. I was weaned on the Gap in its glory years. After Levi’s 501s, they defined the blue jean culture that was in full flower in the age of Flower Children. In their simplicity and clarity, they just got it right. Cool. Easy. Part of the zeitgeist. Along the way, they lost their way and continued to flounder for years, casting about for “relevant designers,” re-designed logos and other silver bullets, all of which misfired. Now with “Back to Blue” bit.ly/23UJEcU Gap is finally doing what I’ve been preaching all along “Go back to doing what you do best – blue jeans and white shirts!” Looks like they’re taking their first step with core denim. I might just enter their upcoming contest myself and talk about what “Back to Blue” means to me, but I wonder now if anyone knows what a Flower Child is anymore…

Tag: blog

Native Advertising: Does It Work?

How to write effectively for social media

AP Style rules most PR folk don’t know

For the love of Beyoncé, please stop using hashtags on Facebook

Hang on there a minute, little company.

Gap…After All These Years, You’ve Finally Come Back To Me.