Social media campaigns are a growing part of the digital commerce strategies for many businesses. These campaigns help reach new customers and build brand loyalty with existing customers. Social media can also be a particularly powerful tool for launching a new product or service. Here are five ways you can successfully launch a new product on social media:
Gather Information
Social media is a great way of collecting insights throughout your entire marketing life cycle. Before you launch any product, you should use your social media feeds to collate feedback from potential customers. This has two benefits; your social media following becomes a focus group and you build interest in the upcoming release of your product/service. There is a useful range of social media analytics tools that can tell you which demographic is most interested in your product/service. Analytics can also show you which users have the most interactions, clicks, and shares. These are important insights into your potential audience, so you can tailor your campaign and launch accordingly.
Teasing a New Product/Service
You can also use social media to build interest in your product/service by advertising before release. A successful pre-launch campaign helps generate new leads, warms up your existing leads, and helps further establish your brand. There are a number of ways you can tease a new product, but social media is perhaps the most cost-effective. Creating a pre-launch teaser doesn't have to be complicated. There are plenty of tried and tested free online templates to choose from or you can employ designers to create something unique to your brand. Choose a design that fits your brand and fill it with content that will create interest without giving away exactly what your new product is.
Promote Pre-Orders + Beta Testing
Pre-orders are a great way to inject cash into a product before it has launched. However, you shouldn't just offer up pre-ordering without any additional benefits to customers. It makes sense to give discounts to those who pre-order and pack the pre-order with a few exclusives of some kind. Promote these pre-orders and incentives on social media to create an air of exclusivity. You can also offer to open beta-testing early for customers who pre-order the product/service. Beta-testing is when you give customers the chance to test out your product/service for a limited period before the official launch. Offering beta testing creates a buzz around your product/service and gives you useful insights from the feedback you receive.
Host Contests
While a contest can generate buzz around your launch we recommend proceeding with caution - it might end up damaging your brand image if it isn't done correctly. For example, running contests that ask users to “like, “share, and “comment are thinly veiled attempts to grow your social media platform, and savvy customers may be put off. If you run a contest, make sure all branding materials align with your overall brand image and think of creative ways for your customers to engage with your social media content.
Create Engagement with other brands
Social media is all about being social! If you want your social campaigns to get people talking and sharing, then you need to actively engage with your audience. Just posting links to your product isn't going to work. Big brands all have dedicated social media content creators who will manage their platforms on their behalf. While you don't need to go this far, you should try to inject some personality into your social media platform by posting content like behind-the-scenes tours, exclusive offers, responding to comments, and engaging with other similar brands.
When engaging with other brands, you should always consider your overall marketing strategy. As a rule of thumb, you don't want to engage with brands who are your immediate competitors but instead you should consider collaborating with similar brands that your customers think highly of. So, for example, if your business sells luxury car accessories, it makes sense to partner with luxury watchmakers or luxury fashion brands.
Finally…
A well-thought-out social media campaign can give your pre-launch marketing efforts a significant boost. You will reach new customers in new locations, build your brand image, and gather useful information during the development and launch of your product. This is all useful stuff and, the best thing is, it can be done at very little cost.
by Frankie Wallace