How To Make Your Audience Feel Something
Hi Social Corner Readers,
The past few weeks have been hectic – I’m sorry about the delay in putting out this issue.
This week I’ll discuss the importance of making your audience feel something. Either a feeling you want to associate with your brand, or a feeling of becoming smarter or more efficient in life.
The problem with brands on social media today is that they plug their products more than they help their target audience improve at something.
The harsh reality is this: People often care most about things that can benefit them. When content helps others, it can eventually help you just as much.
Brands Should Make You Feel Something
Since the beginning of social media, brands have continued to post product shots to their Instagram and Facebook feeds in the hopes that people will bite. And, although this isn’t the worst thing you can do, it’s not the best way to drive awareness of your brand or sales – not in the beginning anyway.
Now unless you’re a designer or premium brand, posting product shots all day long isn’t going to build you the community – and, more importantly – the trust you desire from social media.
When you think about brands that do social media well, their content strategy comes down to one question: through our products, what can we make our core audience feel? Let’s look at a couple of examples:
Redbull:
Redbull posts no pictures of their canned drinks whatsoever. Instead, they focus on making viewers feel like the impossible is possible. They make content for the ones that love an adventure – all while carefully plugging their brand name or logo into their content, thus creating an association of “x” feelings with their brand.
Redbull makes you feel more alive.
Hims
Another brand that does social well is Hims. In this example, they sporadically plug their products, but only about 10% of the time. The rest of the time they post content that educates their audience around topics related to their content – or brand as a whole. Hims’ goal is to help men feel at their best. This means optimizing their sleep, their sex life, their nutrition, and so on.
By posting mainly educational content and relatable memes, they build trust as an authority figure in their niche, and, as a by-product, people trust their products since they’ve learned a lot from their content.
Hims makes you feel smarter about your own body.
Implementing this into your social strategy
When it comes to your own social content, ask yourself the following questions to help with content creation ideas:
Who is my core audience?
What do I want them to feel?
What do I know a lot about that I can teach them?
How does my product help them achieve “X”?
These are all great questions to help steer your strategy in the right direction.
In my experience growing social channels, education is one of the best forms of content a brand can create.
In addition, educational content is one of the best ways to continually plug your product without making individual product shots that end up putting people to sleep.
Nobody cares about a picture of a SaaS product,
but they do care about how a SaaS product can help them lower their churn, increase their sales, or improve their efficiency.
That’s all for this week, Social Corner family. If you’re new around here, why not subscribe? It’s free.