Learning more about the psychological aspects of social media to improve marketing
Learning more about your target market is crucial for those who want to take advantage of social media for business purposes. In order to get information about the target audience, you have to use some well-established psychology rules that will help you put yourself in their shoes. We will use this article to reveal a few psychology principles that will boost your social media marketing efforts.
What’s behind people’s need to share content over social media?
Take a closer look at your social media profile. Can you tell why you have shared some of the videos, articles and other forms of content on your profile? Apparently, there is more than one good reason why we do this.
First of all, we feel that by sharing content in this way, we can have a positive impact on other people. We strongly believe that we can enhance the lives of our friends, followers, and fans. Obviously, marketers must come up with useful content that can improve people’s lives. Next, we share content via social media because it helps us tell the world who we are. We want to show ourselves in the best possible light – as people who can be role models to others.
This means that you should publish content on social media that will match the interests and needs of your target audience.
Furthermore, according to some surveys, people also like to share content on social media when they want to be noticed. In other words, they want to tell others that they are here and they want to engage in conversations. Use the content you share to support users’ efforts to connect with each other. One way to do this is to recommend them to tag friends in comments or promise a reward for sharing your status (a free eBook for example).
Of course, people also like to share content on social media so they can get social signals. Marketers should look for the best ways to generate content that can trigger social signals and comments and content that is highly shareable. Finally, social media users frequently share things that they find supportive of their cause and beliefs. Try to relate your brand to a certain cause and build content that will connect these things.
Take these things into account whenever you are trying to create new content on social media, no matter whether we are talking about Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn or other popular social media networks.
The role of colors
We all know how important images and videos are in today’s marketing but have you ever wondered whether some simple elements in marketing messages like colors are important or not? It turns out that the colors you use on social media have a strong impact. Modern people don’t have long attention spans and it usually takes a minute or two for them to decide whether something is worth their attention or not. Some studies have shown that the majority of decisions they make are directly affected by the colors they see.
It is obvious that there are no “good” colors and “bad” colors. What you should keep in mind is that you must use colors and shades that match your products/services and brand in general. The psychology of colors is a very complex field, but what every marketer and business owner should know is that colors must match the personality of their brand not the expectations of the potential customers.
If you want to make the best selection of colors for your social media strategy, you must think about your brand image.
Consider the message you are trying to share and what kind of colors can support this message. Take some time to learn more about the colors and their meaning, but don’t forget that they can have different meanings depending on the context. Watch a few videos and images used as part of successful marketing campaigns before you start selecting colors.
Trust plays a major role in this process
Let’s be honest – would you buy something from someone that you don’t know and looks shady? The answer is NO. That’s why marketers must start building trust on social media right away.
If you want to build trust on social media you have to work on a few things. Generally speaking, in terms of psychology, people like to belong to large groups that share their opinions or even their needs and requirements. This is the main reason why you should start increasing the number of followers and fans on social media as soon as possible. There are a few things that you can do to boost the number of fans/followers. For example, you can buy them from reputable sellers. Opt only for high-quality providers because you need real followers, not useless bots that won’t leave any social signals. Share useful content that has a potential to go viral and do this on a regular basis. Create incentives and competitions to get noticed. As you can see, there are many things that you can do to make your page/profile more popular.
It’s in people’s nature to start following things that are followed by many other people.
Check your profile if you don’t believe us. Sometimes you are liking and following pages/profiles that you don’t really need or want to follow just because they have thousands of fans. You just want to stay informed and see what’s going on these profiles, what makes other people so interested in that particular page.
To put it in simple words, when it comes to social media marketing you must encourage users to create their own content and share it with you. For example, you can ask them to share their thoughts, ideas or experiences. Ask them for suggestions too. You must show the audience that you care about their opinion. In addition, you can also allow user/customer reviews. Numerous surveys have confirmed that people tend to buy things, follow brands and build trust in businesses that have many positive reviews. This is quite natural – if something has worked for many people, it will probably work for them too. This is especially true for the younger generation because they tend to follow the latest trends.
Spreading the emotions
There is no doubt that triggering specific emotions can support your efforts as a marketer to boost the overall shareability of your message. There is a certain psychological arousal that people experience whenever they are sharing information or stories that they believe are interesting. Their beliefs are based on the emotional encouragement that the message carries.
But, keep in mind that there are two basic types of emotions – negative and positive. The truth is that they both work, but it’s better to use positive emotions in your content because this content is more shareable.
There is more than one way in which you can use this kind of messages. For example, you can find some stories that cause a feeling of well-being and happiness from your niche or clients. It’s also a smart move to add some humor to the content you want to share. Make sure that the humor is appropriate and related to your industry.
Furthermore, try to encourage the target audience to share their positive impressions. Run a contest or make them use the comment section. For instance, a restaurant can ask their customers to share an image of the best meal they had. Another good idea is to ask some of your employees to tell a story that will inspire other people.
By learning more about the psychological aspects of social media and the behavior of your audience, you will be able to witness social media success. Put yourself in the position of your target audience and share content that really means something to this category of people.