Posts by Maisie

Last week, on Friday the 7^th of June, our team took part in the Google Digital Garage Day hosted by Dean Clough. The event held by Google covered a variety of digital skills, ranging from the utilisation of AI in marketing strategies to writing for social media.

What did we learn?

Writing for social media

One of the first points to be established in the discussion was the necessity to define your brand’s voice and personality. Forming your brand voice starts with figuring out your values and beliefs and uncovering what tone of voice best suits your messaging.  Your brand personality is the traits and characteristics that your brand will embody.

Gaining an understanding of your audience’s motivators and pain points is super important when producing content for them. One of the best techniques to establish a pain point or motivator is to partake in social listening exercises, typically a brand will monitor customer feedback and discussions on social platforms.

When positioning content, a product or service to your audience, don’t just provide the features that make it a desirable thing. Instead, let the audience know the benefits the product, content or service could have on their life. Sell the lifestyle that your brand can provide to customers and help them visualise it too.  

Google proposes we should always include a CTA (call to action). Calls to action prompt your customers to take further action, typically urging them to buy a product, subscribe or click a link.  A CTA encourages the next step for the audience and makes it a lot easier to navigate doing so.

Customer service should always be about building a strong rapport with your audience. Trust needs to be built and the audience needs to feel heard and respected.  When handling a customer complaint, it’s important to listen and stay professional, i.e. avoiding humorous language.

One of the last points made surrounding content creation was the consideration needed as dual screening, also known as second screening, becomes more common. Second screening is when a person is using two or more devices to consume content, such as their mobile phone and computer. As this becomes the standard, marketers need to find ways to position adverts and content across platforms and devices. Doing so will help raise brand awareness and provide more of an opportunity to be noticed. One method of doing this is having synchronised ads, which is done by displaying adverts on two screens within a short time frame to get the acquisition.

Boosting productivity with AI

As we moved on to the next point of learning, Google discussed a fundamental part of understanding AI is to be able to make the distinction between predictive and generative AI models.  Predictive AI looks at the data it has been fed and makes a prediction based on patterns and relationships found.  Whereas generative AI uses the data it has been provided to produce new data sets.

Large language models such as Google Gemini or Chat GPT are essentially large processors which are fed data. The LLM is essentially a probability engine that has considered factors to help determine results.  As the speakers made clear during the discussion, wielding AI requires an understanding of how it works and what to be aware of.  One of the main points noted was AI’s ability to create ‘hallucinations. Hallucinations are where non-factual information is pulled through to the answer. It’s important to always challenge the integrity of the results and consider the quality and neutrality of the results being pulled through.

When using an LLM you mustn’t feed any private data into it as the whole basis of the model is that it will be utilised to learn from and provide answers to other relevant queries.

Content creation

When crafting content with the help of AI, the AI needs to provide a wider context outside of the content you’re looking to make. This means feeding it information about your brand, the goals you have, the direction of the content, the audience it is being positioned to, and general information regarding your brand.

Scale is a process used when creating content, starting with defining success which then leads to creative excellence, and then looking at how to achieve the goals in your projects. You need to identify the lifecycle of your content. The last step is to experiment with your process, trial new and old techniques and use each failure as an opportunity to learn.

When creating a content plan some fundamental things need to be outlined, the first and most important is to outline the goals and objectives.  Then you need to work out what your resources and budget are to work out what is achievable. Identifying who the audience is critical, ultimately this is who will be consuming the content, products and services and as such you need to know who it is you are positioning your brand to.  Once you understand your audiences, you need to map out which platforms you will utilise, this is especially important when considering the different styles and formats that work for each platform’s audience.  

The final steps in the process are to plan, execute and analyse using the SMART method. SMART goals allow us to set goals and objectives for a campaign. It provides a set of criteria which you can later use to analyse the results of your campaign.

• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time

The Intelligency team absolutely loved attending the event, it was insightful, engaging and a fantastic opportunity to meet some of our peers! We look forward to attending the next one and bringing you along with us.

What is a trend?

A trend is recognised as a pattern, it shows that people are responsive to a campaign, topic, brand or person over a period, and then typically a trend will naturally lose traction.

Trends can occur across all sectors, and as such trends can influence the styles of the seasons, formats of videos, and behaviours and lifestyle choices.

As a trend gains traction, people engage with it, perhaps they buy into it, or at the very least contribute to the discussion that enables a thing to trend. These collective behaviours of audiences are what make trends an invaluable tool for marketing strategies.

Why are trends so valuable in marketing?

Trends now symbolise a moment in time in which something was relevant to the masses, which is why it’s important to jump on them when they’re appropriate. As a brand, you should be creating content to demonstrate to your audience that you are relevant. This can help shape the way new and existing audiences perceive the brand (select a trend with intention and a plan).

A trend can also provide a bit of respite for generating ideas. Take TikTok content as an example, the video format or style is typically pre-determined.  All that needs to be done is to find a way to combine the trend with your overall objective, and then produce the content. An example scenario of how this may apply:

Let’s say there’s a video of a person saying “This. This is perfect” which may have gone viral due to the usability of the sound. Then other creators would use the audio out of context to support whatever piece of content they have. It would then be posted to socials where it is engaged due to the trending audio having sentiment around it.  

Because Trending audio, videos and hashtags tend to have a page on platforms dedicated to them, it makes the content visible to all those adding to the trend, or who are engaging with it. This increases the reach and visibility of these pieces of content as it is positioned at a much larger audience.

What’s particularly useful with this, is like-minded individuals who aren’t aware of the brand, are more likely to see the content because of the algorithm frequently displaying trending topics.

Trending content often reflects customers’ behaviours and preferences, which is a valuable tool for better understanding your audience. This can then help inform your future marketing strategy by identifying what the audience is most receptive to.

How to follow a trend?

1) Identify the trend

The most important part of this step is staying up to date with what is going on across the varying social platforms. This means instead of having to look for the right trends, they should start to find you.

2) Identify the relevance to your brand

Don’t just hop on a trend because it’s happening. Instead, select the trend you partake in with the intention of it benefiting your overall strategy. Only select trends that are likely to benefit your brand, even after the trend has passed. Ultimately your content needs to have some form of value, other than the sentiment attached to the trend.

3) Take a step back and re-interpret the trend in a way that will be relevant in 6 months to 6 years.

Similarly to the last step, consider its relevancy in a few months. For people who aren’t aware of the trend, you want the content to still serve them. So, try to bring something to the content that honours the trend but will have value for your customer down the line.

4) Outline how you’re going to fit your content to the trend

Map out how you are going to record the content and create a plan which outlines the visual or audio elements you need to collect.

5) Go out and create

6) Utilise all relevant audio, visuals, copy or hashtags associated with the trend to display the content alongside other creators.

When you publish the content, you need to ensure that it is going to be uploaded to the right place and check that any hashtags, audio or visual elements are included. You will then need to publish the content and prepare to track the analytics.

7) Analyse your content

Analysis is almost the most important stage apart from the content itself. The data allows you to analyse what is and isn’t working, to optimise future content to the preferences and behaviours of the customers.

We’d love to know if you’ve ever hopped on a trend, and if so, what was it?

Google have announced a change to their offerings, the call and chat feature associated with business listing will be scrapped on the 31^st of July 2024. The announcement came as businesses were emailed by Google, warning them of the upcoming adjustments.

The email reads “We are reaching out to share that we will be winding down Google’s chat feature in Google Business Profile on July 31, 2024. We acknowledge this may be difficult news – as we continually improve our tools, we occasionally have to make difficult decisions which may impact the businesses and partners we work with. It’s important to us that Google remains a helpful partner as you manage your business, and we remain committed to this mission.

Google will stop creating new conversations after July 15, and chat functionality will fully end on July 31. Please note, customers will still be able to find and contact your business via Google Search and Maps – and learn more information about you from your website links, business description, photos, and anything else you share on your Business Profile.”

What does this mean?

Users will no longer be able to contact businesses using the feature, and businesses will be unable to access the history of calls and chats with customers. Customers seeking out contact information on Google will still be provided with the businesses’ contact details on maps and the Search Engine Results Page ( SERP).

Existing customers can expect to be notified by the 15^th of July, which they’ll be given a warning about the phasing out. Any users attempting to start a chat on the 15^th will be unable to do so.

Downloading your history

For businesses wanting access to their chats and call history, they will still have the opportunity to do so up until the 30^th of August 2024,  it can be accessed and downloaded with Google Takeout.

Google Takeout allows users to retrieve and download all of their data collected by Google. This encompasses all Google products, allowing users to export and store their data separately to Google.

Seeking alternatives?

Businesses have been advised by Google to find an alternative means for their customer communications. It’s of great importance that you offer a telephone number or email for customers to contact your business through.

 Offering basic customer services allows your business to develop strong customer relations and improve the business for the customers using it. This also gives the customer the opportunity to contact you ahead of time about their requests.

Here are some of the alternatives we would suggest:

• Zendesk – Allows customer communications from any platform to be fed into a single chat (per customer) on Zendesk. The CRM also offers an AI chatbot which you can program to answer to specific questions.
• A chatbot provides customers with answers without taking away from the time of real employees.
• Live chat is a great way to offer human responses to customer queries without the need for multiple phone lines.
• Telephony systems – associated buttons linked to specific queries. This will allow the customer service team to sort through queries quicker and easier by having each call already assorted.
• Social media will continue to be one of the greatest tools for customer service, it allows for real-time updates and for communication between customers and businesses. 
• For some businesses offering a video meeting/consultation is the best approach to customer services, this can be done utilising Microsoft Teams, Google or Jitsi to do so.

The change is likely to see many businesses looking for different ways to communicate with their customer base. We’re interested to know if this is a feature you have used, and if so, how would this impact your rapport with a business?

Ad campaigns are a marketing tool used to position brands or products to new and existing audiences. Ads are an effective way to promote products as there are a plethora of types of ads that marketers can use. Ads come in all forms, allowing brands to market their content in the most fitting manner for their customer personas. Some of the most used types of ads include print adverts, broadcasts (TV, radio, and podcasts), social media, display ads, guerilla and outdoor.

Why is advertising still so important?

Specific types of ads such as display or social media ads, allow brands also to gather data on clicks, leads and conversions. When brands are given insight through ads, they can then tailor the next campaign to meet the needs/behaviours of the audience.

A resonating campaign must attain one of the following qualities to be considered memorable: messaging, visuals, catchphrases, or slogans, or it may be informative. Some of the best ads are the ones we reminisce about years after they were aired, published, or launched.

Which campaigns have resonated strongly with audiences?

Considering the lasting impacts that ads can have, we have gathered some of the most iconic British and American ad campaigns to discuss the success and impact they had.

Viral Smile – Smile, 2022

The horror film Smile was released in September of 2022 and grossed $13,144,628 in the UK alone. Their approach saw models and actors placed within crowds at three baseball games in the US. The actors adorning luminous yellow ‘Smile’ t-shirts, positioned tactfully in the line of the camera to help promote the film’s release.

What was particularly effective for this campaign was the crowd’s participation in reporting their sightings on social media accounts. This made the campaign go viral on Twitter, which propelled the overall success of the film.

“Snoop Dogg” – Just Eat

Just Eats innovative ad campaign featuring Snoop Dogg, proves that jingles are one of the many ways ads can have a lasting impression. The campaign has gained notoriety for having a catchy jingle. it goes to show finding the right talent to collaborate with can really help improve a brand’s reputation.

Snoop Dogg in particular has a considerable following with currently 87 million followers on Instagram alone. His social media presence seemed to help create conversation and traction around the Just Eats brand. The catchy jingle is possibly one of the most effective marketing tactics, forging connections between pop culture and the food and drink industry. Utilising influence to push the service ultimately makes it so easy to recognise and sing along with.

Like a Girl – Always

Like a Girl can be defined as a campaign with high societal impact, statistically proven to have psychologically disrupted the norm of the time. The belief was that a woman is less capable of physical activities in comparison to a man. The campaign now allows us to reflect upon the changing perceptions of the time and how conversations are starting to change.

The Campaign made waves, shifting the perspective on what it means to do something ‘like a girl’. The campaign’s ability to raise awareness, and shift the conversation and perspective is a clear indication of the impact it had.

Knitted by Nanas – Shreddies

The Shreddies Knitted by Nana’s campaign is a fondly reminisce upon the campaign. The campaign spanned multiple years and featured multiple iterations of adverts.

The psychology of airing times is particularly interesting in this campaign as it proved to be done effectively. The airing time couldn’t have been better as it was aired over the early hours of the morning, a method used to encourage sales and subliminally position Shreddies as the perfect choice.

Cog – Honda

Cog by Honda allowed product marketing to shift into a new realm of creativity, proving ads that incorporate visuals and some forms of narrative are ones to remember. Cog’s narrative is simple, as each component of the car journey to the whole Honda Civic, enticing the audience to watch as each element takes its place.

This reimagined way of advertising a car, allowed audiences to invest time into the ad before fully understanding what was being promoted. At the point of the reveal in the advert, there’s a lot to have taken in, creating food for thought for audiences.

Dumb Ways to Die – Melbourne Metro

Similarly, to the Just Eats campaign, Dumb Ways to Die will always be recognised by the masses for its catchy jingle. Its playful nature makes it both endearing and silly, the lyrics are kept simple and that’s what makes it such an earworm!

The campaign was an absolute success for Melbourne Metro. It helped raise awareness of staying safe with a reported 21% decrease in incidents. International spectators still felt the impact of the campaign, from a different perspective as seeing the Dumb Ways to Die campaign as a brand. It demonstrates the entity this campaign became. Multiple games, millions of views, followers, and the most shared video of 2012.

FCK – KFC

KFC’s responsive campaign set the tone for how brands respond to moments of pressure and criticism. The witty campaign’s play on words was a really effective way to position the brand, appearing to be honest and self-aware. Their ability to quickly respond to the chicken shortage scandal in such an effective way proved to be an asset to the brand and the marketing industry as a whole.

Similarly to Smile, the campaign was a major hit on social platforms and allowed space for the brand’s customer base to have an open dialogue with customer services and other customers. Connecting the brand with the customers in such a way allowed for trust to be maintained as well as their overall reputation.

Our key takeaways

From visuals, plots and jingles, every campaign has left some sort of impression on our lives. Each campaign has its own way of embedding into our memory, each approach to the differing campaigns demonstrates the creativity and unique methods for selling products and services. 

What is clear, is a successful campaign is not as simple as one size fits all.  It does however prove that no matter how simple or extravagant a campaign is, it’s the bones of the campaign that counts. It’s the messaging, imagery and audio elements that linger in our minds. If there’s anything modern campaigns can take influence from, it’s the creative approach to a campaign. Evaluating the goals of a campaign and finding the best way to position ads to new and existing audiences.

References

47 Marketing. (2020, January 23). Knitted by Nana’s campaign development for Nestle Cereals | 47 Marketing. https://47marketing.co.uk/case-studies/nestle-cereals/

Analysis of Shreddies Marketing campaign. (2014, April 22). Zak Reino’s Business Blog. https://zakreinobuisness.wordpress.com/analysis-of-shreddies-marketing-campaign/

Brownsell, A. (2019, June 7). KFC: A very fcking clever campaign. Campaign. https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/kfc-fcking-clever-campaign/1498912#:~:text=According%20to%20data%20from%20YouGov,7%25%20before%20the%20problems%20began

Brophy, A. (2018, June 27). Ad of the month – KFC. YouGov. https://yougov.co.uk/consumer/articles/21080-ad-month-kfc

COG: The most influential advert ever? | Honda Engine Room. (n.d.). https://www.honda.co.uk/engineroom/cog/

Dumb Ways to Die. (2012, November 15). Dumb ways to die [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJNR2EpS0jw

Fra. (2011, October 13). Honda – The story of Cog. This Is Not ADVERTISING. https://thisisnotadvertising.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/honda-the-story-of-cog/

Honda Motor Company. (2003, April 6). The Cog. [Advertisement] YouTube. https://youtu.be/Z57kGB-mI54?si=F8sYYoSwGPKJd9Ef

Insight & Strategy: #LikeAGirl. (n.d.). Contagious. https://www.contagious.com/news-and-views/insight-strategy-likeagirl

Just Eat. (2020, July 27). Did Somebody Say – Just Eat ft. Snoop Dogg (Official Video w/ subtitles) [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFPEedHvHqs

Just Eat | Just Eat | Just Eat ft. Snoop Dogg. (n.d.). https://caples.org/2021-winners-results/?id=237&cat=Traditional%20media#:~:text=In%20the%20first%203%20days,to%20someone%20in%20their%20DMs

Louissteven. (2016, February 24). Dumb ways to die. Dumb Ways to Die. https://dumbwaystodiecasestudy.wordpress.com/#:~:text=The%20campaign%20was%20wildly%20successful,(Brand%20News%2C%202013)

Made Global case study – Just Eat – Advertising Association. (2021, August 25). Advertising Association. https://adassoc.org.uk/our-work/made-global-case-study-just-eat/

Moreau, E. (2023, September 18). Dumb Ways to Die — The effectiveness of a serious game. Medium. https://emiliemoreau.medium.com/the-effectiveness-of-a-serious-game-dumb-ways-to-die-78fb778cdb15

MOSAIC. (2018, May 3). Always #LikeAGirl [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxrPeFKtUwQ

Nestlé. (2007) Knitted by Nannas. [Advertisement]

Our epic battle #LikeAGirl. (n.d.). https://www.always.co.uk/en-gb/about-us/campaigns-and-initiatives/our-epic-battle-like-a-girl/

Smile (2022) – IMDB. (n.d.). IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15474916/reviews

Smile – viral marketing (2022) The Shorty Awards. Available at: https://shortyawards.com/15th/smile-viral-marketing

Trayner, D. (2018, February 23). KFC apologises over chicken shortage with cheeky ad – and Twitter LOVES it. . . The Sun. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/5649831/kfc-advert-chicken-shortage-apology-twitter/

UKAEG. (2022, September 28). Snoop Dogg in ‘Did Somebody Just Say’ x Just Eat Takeaway | UKAEG. https://ukaeg.com/case-study/snoop-dogg-in-did-somebody-just-say-x-just-eat-takeaway/

Frequently Asked Questions offer your audience a deeper understanding of your services and products. They allow you as a brand to address any reoccurring questions all in one place, making it easy for the customer to navigate finding answers to their queries. 

FAQs don’t just serve the users, they also help Google recognise your brand as one that is providing useful content, ultimately enhancing its user’s experience. Quality user experiences help boost your ranking, so if you were on the fence about creating them, do!

How to write an FAQ section?

Firstly, you need to identify the commonly asked questions and write them all down, this means you can add questions or refer to see if it has been asked before. Once you’ve identified the questions, see if you can categorise them.

Look into both long-tailed and short-tailed search terms also used on search terms to write answers that searchers who may not have intended to find your page, do.

An example of this would be when people ask about shipping times or the packaging. Though they are not asking the same thing, they both address shipping queries and therefore can be put into the same category.

Figure out how you want the layout on the page, determine the hierarchy of questions and position the most common or useful towards the top of the page for ease of access. Make sure the FAQ page is easy to find too, this could be done by adding a button to the Navigation bar or one on the footer as users typically search for it in these areas.

Lastly and most importantly, make sure all the information is kept up to date as time passes, customer questions may start to shift, or you might find a question is being used less/ more frequently. When you notice these changes, adjust the content to reflect the changes in the needs of the customers.

How FAQ pages can benefit your business

High ranking is everything when trying to maintain existing audiences and reach new ones. That’s why it’s super important to consider implementing FAQs on your website, this can be with a page, or placing the FAQ under product descriptions. This is a great way to address those long-tail search phrases, by implementing the search terms into the keywords needed in the FAQs.

For brands that Google perceive as incredibly useful and factually correct, there’s the opportunity to be displayed in the featured answer box, in position 0 on Google’s page. This means that the content would be the first thing to appear on a searcher’s results page.

Users can build trust with a brand that is transparent about the products or service, creating trust also forges the path to retaining customers. Customers will have less need to contact customer services which will also help relieve the customer service team from answering the same queries over and over again.

Instagram’s algorithm is finally being updated, providing small creators and those making unique and original content the opportunity to reach a larger audience. The algorithm will now recommend content to more users, this is due to a shift in the prioritisation of content.

Prioritisation of content was previously based on the success of a creator’s content and the volume of followers they had acquired.

A brief video made by the head of Instagram; Adam Mosseri explains the update.

How will the algorithm know how to display content if it is not based on the success of engagement with previous posts?

The algorithm takes factors such as videos and posts users have shared, commented on and saved, into account. Then the algorithm assesses the account that published the post. It looks at the previous interactions’ users may have had with it. This is then factored into how content will be distributed. 

Aggregator accounts

Aggregator accounts are the accounts that res-share content, usually, this content will be taken from other creators and other platforms. Aggregators currently make up a large percentage of content that is displayed to users but will soon be reduced.

Instagram has emphasized that original posts by content creators will be given the appropriate credit when the original content can be located.

Aggregator accounts will now need to re-shape any reused content so that it has unique and new content within it, to be displayed to new users again. Not to fret though, those who are crediting and reposting content will still have theirs displayed to their followers.

Instagram notes that aggregator accounts will be able to get recommendations, 30 days after their last piece of reposted content (that has not been adjusted to be unique). Users can monitor this using the account status overview.

Content labelling

Content labelling is brought to Instagram to negate aggregator account content reposts.  

Reposted content will now divert directly back to the original content. The labelling will pop up as a notification on the home screen, as content is being swiped through in-app and in the notifications tab.

This will keep creators’ original content ‘protected’ from content being used without any credit.

Another benefit of content labelling is protecting creators’ content and reputations. Often accounts will take content from other creators and use it out of its original context. This can be harmful to creators and brands, as the re-uploaded content may not represent their beliefs or ideas but is associated with their content due to it being reposted.

Censorship

Currently, some creators face censorship of their content.

With the ‘sensitive content’ label comes a lot of issues for creators whose content is unfortunately and unfairly included under the umbrella of sensitive content. This results in posts being hidden from their following as well as new unique users.

 Instagram stipulates that sensitive content can be adjusted within the settings, limiting the type of content you may see that contains something ‘sensitive’.

The problem that arises with labelling things as ‘sensitive content’ is it does not look at the wider context of the content. For example, a page featuring entomology is censored due to the portrayal of a dead insect. Yet the wider context of this is that the insects are sustainable and ethical sources of the animals, and no violence is seen on screen.

Harnessing the features of Instagram is essential when creating a well-rounded business presence. In this article, we explore all the features you can use to enhance the quality of your business’s social presence.

Link in Bio & Link trees

Including a link within your bio is a great way to provide upfront access to your website or affiliate websites. Displaying a link or using a link tree can help your audience reach the product or service with ease, making it simpler for creators and brands to promote consistently across platforms.

Link trees make it possible for creators and brands to display all their relevant links in one place. Audiences have easy access to the pages they want in just as little as two clicks. 

Connect your store

Both Instagram and Facebook allow businesses to connect their stores to the platforms, tag products, connect ads to the store, and have direct access to the store via the business’s profile. Businesses must make use of connecting their store to Metas platforms, so their customer’s journey to the products or services is simplified.

Connecting your store offers so many benefits to your social media marketing. Keeping your social media marketing campaigns cohesive across all platforms is likely to optimise the potential audiences and customers seeing and connecting with the brand. This creates opportunity where otherwise there would not be.

Instagram offers great insight into how to set up your shop.

Reels

Reels offer up to 90 seconds per video, ideal for short-form content surrounding campaigns, ads, and recycled content. On public accounts, reels have a large reach that encompasses non-followers of the brand too.

Creators can produce videos to trending audio, this feature is especially practical for brands when producing relevant and engaging content. Remixing allows creators to produce reactive content, displaying as a split screen. Creating content that is responsive to events or trends is made simple, duetting the content will also enable the brand/creators to reach the other creators’ audiences.   

Live streams

Live streaming is a fantastic way to reach newer audiences and can even be done in collaboration with other accounts to connect different audiences. Additionally, live streaming offers audiences real-time insight into how a brand chooses to present itself, showing personality can be represented authentically and naturally with the use of going live.

Livestreaming also gives audiences the capability to respond to content in real-time, giving clear insight into their engagement and responsiveness. Being able to see feedback from customers as it is happening will allow brands to tailor content to the audience’s wants and needs.

Collaborative posts

Though the feature is not yet available on desktops, those controlling their accounts from mobile apps will find they can create collaborative posts. Collaborative posts are displayed across any accounts that have collaborated.

To enable this post feature, you will need to navigate to the ‘tag people’ section and then locate the ‘invite collaborator’ button.

Collaborating allows brands to share audiences, leading to greater exposure and brand awareness. Collaborate enables brands to explore topics that may not be relevant through just the perspective of their stand-alone brand. Brands displaying, they have built a rapport with other brands and creators demonstrate the connective power of the collaborate feature. 

Instagram stories

Stories give insight into the daily on-goings of brands or creators as it is happening, making it one of the most useful features of the app. The live updates can be especially great when trying to bring personality to a brand’s reputation.

Public story threads also known as ‘add yours’ stickers are small stickers that can be added to a story to publish it to a public story. The feature allows brands to hop onto trends, showing real-time responsiveness to the current internet cultures adopted by many users on Instagram. The feature works like a chain, and as such, enables non-following users to access and respond to the content.

Stories also offer a brilliant feature which allows creators to retrospectively mention other users after the story has already gone live. This can be done by clicking on the three dots, locating ‘more’ and then selecting ‘add mention’. This feature is especially handy when accidentally forgetting to tag other users.

We’d love to know, do you use Instagram or any of these features already? Feel free to contact us if you’re looking to expand your business’s social media presence or are interested in growing your brand’s online presence.

Producing copy for a blog can be quite straightforward once the process is in place. In this article, we’ll break down the key stages of writing copy and provide some tips to ensure that the content you release is of the highest quality.

Research 

Research is fundamental in the step towards producing a blog/article. Research allows for information to be compiled, it deepens our understanding of topics and often enhances the quality of the work with the inclusion of relevant knowledge. 

Research can help you identify the key points in your discussion, allowing you to break down each section or topic. Once you can identify the sections of your discussion, you can undertake research it the more niche subject matters of your discussion. When writing content, it’s essential to break it down into digestible, concise sections. This will ensure that the readers can follow along with ease and select the relevant sections to their inquiry. 

Research is super important; you need to have a great understanding of the topics you are discussing. Google and respective search engines will trawl the information you have given and provide the ranking based on the quality, usefulness and how SEO friendly it is. 

Starting to write

When starting to write your copy it’s important to identify the structure of the content, outlining a title and sub-headings is a great way to gauge the layout, the number of words per section and how to tie each section together. 

When developing a title for your work, consider two things: the first is to convey the overarching topic or themes of discussion. The second is to make it enticing, consider how to frame the title. Can you phrase it to make it sound useful for the reader? Consider framing it as a question, that way when searchers are inquiring through Google, your content is identified as addressing that query. 

An alternative to framing the title as a question is to grab the attention of the user. Using highly descriptive language, allows the user to understand the topic whilst keeping it short and simple. A great example of this would be when you see an article about a celebrity, and it reads ‘So and so stuns on the BAFTA red carpet’. Keeping it short and snappy will typically create curiosity within the reader, encouraging them to read. 

Subheadings should signpost the different points of discussion. This allows the audience to navigate your article much more easily. Aim to keep the sub-headings super simple, them being easy to find and quick to read will enhance the quality and ease of the reader’s experience. 

Keywords 

Keywords are a huge part of SEO (search engine optimisation) so it’s super important to outline what words you will need to incorporate into the copy. This will ensure the language used is relevant to the topic, as you will need to make sure the word you use is flagged when people search for your topic or other relevant queries. 

Keywords can be found using analytical tools such as Google Search Console, SEMrush and SE Ranking.

Long-tail keywords are search terms with 3 words or more, it is the whole query rather than a single word. 

Short-tail keywords are short search terms, typically one or two words at most. 

Review & Edit

Once you have written your first or second draft, review the content and make the necessary adjustments. Then the final draft can be written, the final draft should tidy up any sections which need re-structuring, and rephrasing and spelling checks should also be undertaken. 

Proofread your copy, not just once or twice, but aim to check roughly three to four times before uploading it. This may be a little bit tedious to do but ultimately it will ensure professionalism and quality are at the highest it can be. 

Ensure any facts, data or case studies are checked, identified, and accredited in your article as this will be flagged as problematic to Google if not identified. 

Publishing 

When publishing your content ensure everything is in the right place, read through one last time to make sure everything is looking and reading as correct. When saving the work, check that it is labelled in a way that is clear and easy to locate. 

Here at Intelligency, we label as follows: 

Year/month/date – Name of client – Title of work – Any additional title or information. 

Make sure your name and the date of publication are on there, this shows the reader who you are and when the copy was published. This provides them with two pieces of important information, the first being who you are, they can then go on to find more of your work. Accrediting your work can only be done when your work is clearly labelled as yours, this will also help prevent others from plagiarising. 

The last check that should be done is once the article or blog has been launched, checking to see how it looks on the website. This will help you flag any major issues with displays or the content itself. This will ultimately prevent your audience from seeing any errors, which will help maintain your professionalism and the way the content is initially perceived. 

If you think this article was useful, please let us know, and, if you have any questions or other ‘how to’ articles you’d benefit from. We are keen to support you in your endeavour to create a copy!

YouTube launches updates for creators using Studio analytics. The update provides clear insight to the audience’s impression and includes both those who are new and those who have come back. This will allow for a deeper understanding of an audience’s responsiveness to content. 

The update is available in YouTube Studio analytics in advanced mode. To navigate and access impressions users will need to select the ‘Analytics’ tab. Under the ‘reach’ section users will be able to locate all of the impression’s metrics. 

Analytic insight will be available for new and older content, enabling creators to undertake comparative analysis and use the data to inform their content strategy. Allowing creators to identify where viewers are being retained and where new audiences are attracted will help identify successful content. 

HDR Live streaming

Creators will be able to live stream in HDR (High Dynamic Range). HDR allows for a greater amount of information to be fed into displays, this is demonstrated in the scope of contrast in both colours and brightness. The richness in hues and luminosity contributes to a higher quality of content that is capable of capturing a considerable amount of detail. It is worth noting, that the monitor the stream is coming from must support the HDR format. 

This is a significant update for streamers striving for high-quality content. One of the main examples of channels this update will benefit is gaming streamers. The intensified colour and light fields vastly improve the gaming experience by creating immersive and life-like visuals. Typically displaying at around 60fps, improving motions and making it look smooth and realistic.

Live stream analytics

Live streamers gain access to audience reaction analytics. The function updates based on current user activity and is presented as a clear breakdown by emoji and the volume of users. The feature is accessible to both mobile and Studio web users, which proves to be convenient for those streaming through their mobile and checking the analytics on a desktop and vice versa. 

It can be found by clicking ‘Content’ and then the ‘Overview’ tabs and can then be found under ‘chat messages and ‘reactions’. 

This will be particularly useful for creators when identifying topics that their audiences are reactive to. Conversely, seeing what content receives the least engagement is a great piece of insight for creators to base content strategies on. Resulting in creators producing content that better meets their audience’s preference.  This applies to the chat message insight too, although it does not provide any qualitative data, this will also improve creators’ understanding of how receptive audiences are to specific subjects. 

What is the trending topics section? 

Trending topics encompass all mass-discussed news and subjects, and the trending topics can be in the ‘for you’ feed as well as the search page. The algorithm used to identify said trending topics will assess and collate topics which users are engaging with most and then content specialist review and compile 5 trending topics, to be displayed to users.

Introducing a trending topics section allows users to connect and discuss worldwide trending subjects. The update brought to US users was released on the 19th of March and came after many users stated the feature was highly desirable.

A trending topic section allows users to explore relevant, current subject matter. As a result, users will be exposed to topics they may have otherwise been unaware of. As well as improving navigation to find topics alongside the ability and ease to engage with them as a result. 

Threads versus X

The trending topics section is a feature that will be familiar to X users (formerly Twitter). Threads being X’s biggest competition offers users 500 characters, whilst X only provides 280, this alone gives users a platform to have in-depth discussions, and less of a need for the continuation of topics into comments. This is not the only difference in offerings, Threads also allows users to upload longer video content, as much as up to five minutes. In contrast to X’s two minutes and twenty-second cap.

Features utilised by both apps:

• Desktop compatible 
• Cross-platform sharing 
• Hashtags
• GIFs, videos, and photos
• Trending section

Utilising ‘trending topics’ within your marketing strategy

Crafting campaigns with the awareness of current trending subjects is an essential part of marketing. Of course, not every topic will have relevance or provide marketers with an opportunity to promote, engage and capitalize off current events. However, when the subject is relevant, it can improve audience visibility, aid in forming attitudes around subjects and can be used to educate both the brand and customers. 

To utilise the feature in an appropriate manner, brands will need to monitor trending topics and select relevant topics to engage with. This has been seen to work well in sectors such as fashion and sports, when events like London Fashion Week occur, fashion brands are able to join the conversation and capitalise by providing content or displaying products that users are likely to respond to. 

Trending topics are beneficial for brands as they can also help gain insight into audiences’ responsiveness to specific topics and events. This will allow brands to analyse what content is most successful for their target audience. Through analysis brands can then determine the format of content that works best for the audience, then apply their content findings in future strategies.