Social Media Advertising has come a long way in a relatively short period of time. In just a few short years online advertising has become an essential part of any business’ marketing plan, and Social Networks are today the preferred online advertising media.
Instead of waiting for consumers to get around to preforming a search before they make a purchase, Social Media Advertising helps businesses find new potential clients by using users’ shared information to identify interest. Rather than reactively targeting users who search a certain term, Social Media Advertising proactively targets relevant users before they even begin their search.
Social Networks are a good option for advertisers because of the advanced targeting options, reliable conversion tracking, and prevalence on mobile devices. As we continue our look at each of the top 5 Social Media channels and the advantages each has to offer, this week our discussion focuses on one of the oldest and well known Social Networks.
Twitter is known as the real-time, public microblogging network where news breaks first. Most users love it for its iconic 140-character limit and, unlike Facebook, its unfiltered feed that showed them absolutely everything. While all major news media have a strong presence, it is the entertainment industry that is by far the most popular category on Twitter. Movie stars, musicians, sports figures, and other entertainers lead the way with the most followers. The instantaneous posts in the newsfeed is the perfect format for viewers to chat with other fans about what they think will happen next on their favorite TV show or sporting event.
Twitter is the fourth largest Social Network with 305 million active monthly users. Twitter is about one fifth the size of Facebook, however, their users are extremely dedicated. According to one study, Twitter is more addictive than cigarettes and alcohol. With over 350,000 tweets posted every minute, a day’s worth of Twitter posts would fill a 10-million-page book.
Due to this fast paced atmosphere, tweets can quickly become buried in a user’s Twitter feed. This makes it difficult to have any sort of visibility for your jewelry store. What you post now may be gone from your followers newsfeed in an hour or less. Because of this, many jewelry stores that have tried Twitter to market their store have given up and abandoned it.
This, however, is no longer a problem with Paid Twitter Ads. When you create an Advertising Campaign on Twitter, they will hold your post and display it prominently in the feed of your target audience.
Targeting
Like other Social Media Networks, on Twitter you can target basic demographics such as age, gender, and geographical area. Although not nearly as extensive as Facebook, Twitter does offer limited interest and behavior targeting. Twitter also allows you to create a tailored audience from your e-mail list to target your ads, as well as targeting followers of any relevant Twitter account.
A unique feature of Twitter targeting is consumers’ TV viewing habits. You can target consumers based on their preference in television shows watched, networks viewed, or type of programing they prefer. Want to advertise sport watches to viewers of sporting events? Want to advertise Mother’s or Father’s Day to people who watch children or family programing? Twitter is an ideal media for you to consider.
Ad Objectives and Budgeting
When it comes to Ad Objectives and Budgeting, Twitter is middle of the road among Social Media Networks. From website clicks, to video views, to building prospect lists, Twitter provides more options for your ads than just promoted posts. However, those options are not nearly as extensive as Facebook.
Your ad cost per objective will not be as expensive as on LinkedIn, but it will cost more than on Instagram and Facebook.
You can set your Daily Ad Budget to any amount you want (I’ve been able to set it as low as 5 cents per day). You do want to set your Daily and Lifetime budgets less than you actually want to spend, as you seem to always be billed a little above your set limits. This is due to the fact that Twitter (unlike other Social Networks) will stop adding your ads to users feeds when you reach the limit, but will continue to bill you for click, views, etc. on the ads already displayed.
What You Need to Know
Twitter’s Ad Manager is one of the easiest to use and not nearly as complicated as Facebook’s. When you go to Twitter’s Ad Manager, Ads.Twitter.com, you will have to set-up some account information the first time you use it. Then select the type of ad campaign you want and all the information for your ad is on one page. Fill out the information for targeting, budget and content. You can scroll up and down the page to review and change any of the items. When you are ready, click the ‘Launch’ button and your ad is all set-up.
Text in your Twitter ads is limited to 144 characters. This limit includes your website address when creating a link ad. Because of this you need to keep your ad copy concise and to the point.
However, unlike Facebook, Twitter does not limit the amount of text in your images. Headlines and details of your promotions can effectively be added to your picture.
Although you can tweet an image of any size, Twitter always displays them at 440 pixels wide and 220 pixels tall (a 2:1 ratio). This means that any image taller than it is wide will be cut off at the top and bottom in the Twitter stream.
We recommend creating 1200 X 600 pixel images to use in your Twitter ads. However, to save time creating your ads, your picture for Facebook Ads (1200 X 627 pixels) can be used on Twitter as well. While these images are not exactly a 2:1 image ratio, the cropping is minimal and they still look great in the Twitter newsfeed!
Next we will complete our look at the top 5 Social Media Networks with a look at the 5th largest Social Media platform, Pinterest. For more information on paid Social Media advertising campaigns, step-by-step directions and templates for your ads go to FeetThruTheDoorMarketing.com.
Brad Simon is co-owner of Internet 4 Jewelers and Feet Thru The Door Marketing. They provide affordable full-service Social Media management and Social Ad Campaign management exclusively for retail jewelry stores as well as online educational programs for local retail stores. For more information contact Brad at 864-680-4416 or Brad@Internet4Jewelers.com.
