Social Media Content Matrix

on Dec 15, 2013by Jodiein Blog, Social media

Developing and sharing content over social media is a powerful marketing tool
for the modern businesses. There are, of course, many different types of content,
each achieving a different effect on an audience. One of the greatest challenges
for any leading social media agency is being able to reduce the ‘black box’
element of social media management. At JC Social Media, we have developed a
simple model to demonstrate exactly what kind of content is going to be
produced for our clients; Cook’s social media content matrix.
 
Social media content broadly falls into one of three types, or a combination of
two or even all three. These are:
– Value-adding
– Interaction
– Self-promotion
Typically, accounts being run by people and companies that don’t ‘get’ social
media content will be far too self-promotional. Content will be more akin to a TV
or radio advertisement – as value-adding (interesting) as possible, but blatantly just
about selling. Here’s our content matrix with an example current and desired
content blend.
 

 
Remember that not every tweet or post will be discreetly value-adding, self-
promotional or interaction.
 
“Hey, @randomer take a look at our amazing 2 for 1 deal on our socks” is both
interaction and self-promotional. Arguably, depending on how interesting the
socks are and how great the deal is, it might be value-adding.
As a car manufacturer, posting a photograph of your latest model hammering it
through the Swiss Alps will add value to fans and followers if they’re really into
the cars. Asking them to guess exactly which mountain range the shot was taken in
makes it more engaging, value-adding and provides a platform for interaction.
Giving the opportunity for your fans to be right and to show-off is going to give
them value from your account but allows you to put a great shot of your car out
there without seeming too self-promotional.

Social media content blend

The optimal social media content blend will vary wildly between industries and
companies. Companies with a large offline presence, benefitting from individuals
wanting to associate with the brand, can afford to be more self-promotional as they
may be inherently adding value to their followers, regardless of what they post.
This isn’t to say that this is good practice and is going to be the best strategy, but
they will still achieve good fan and follower numbers and receive high levels of
interaction.
For the majority of lesser-known brands, growing an online presence involves
piecing together high-quality, storytelling posts that do not threaten the social
sphere of the consumer who will instantly put their defences up if they’re being
sold to. In order to grow the brand through social, shareability is the key, but for
this, you need really value-adding and engaging material that captures the
imagination.

Content vs interaction

“Content is king” is the age-old phrase when it comes to social media marketing
and I’m sure it was coined by a marketing whizz. The truth is that social media
content provides the foundation of a thriving social presence but that can only go
so far, especially if you’re the owner of a lesser-known brand.
 
But is content really king?
 
A wise man (Gary Vaynerchuk) once said “Twitter is the only social media
network, all of the other are content platforms”. Now, to the untrained, this might
seem like a strange comment, but as a business, this is absolutely true. Only on
Twitter can a business actively seek and interact with current and prospective
clients and collaborators. Over other platforms, you can only interact once
someone has interacted with you, i.e. if they comment on a Facebook post, for
example.
Since Facebook has been the mother of social media for a decade, most company’s
first forays into the world of social media was on the Zuckerberg juggernaut. This
meant that for most, social media represented another channel through which to
distribute its promotional content to its fans and would be fans. Sooner rather than
later, brand realised this approach was met with a fairly frosty reception and the art
of using a friendly ‘voice’ and value-adding content became far more important!
 

Image credit: jeffbullas

 
Suddenly, social media content became ‘king’ and everyone lived happily ever
after… BUT, interaction, actual communication with individuals over Twitter, is
an incredibly powerful function of the platform and one upon which many brands
fail to capitalise. The opportunity for smaller brands, therefore, (who know what
they’re doing!) is massive in both terms of growing the brand AND in actual lead
and sales generation.
 

Self-promotional content

So what’s so wrong with self-promotion?

We’ve looked how two-way conversational platforms that have millions of
consumers conversing with friends, strangers and brands alike all in one place. It is
simply not the place to apply traditional advertising techniques. Think about it
from the consumer’s point of view – you’re a consumer at times, right?

Most people are on Facebook to keep up with their friends and see what’s
going on in the world. And cats.
Companies invade this space. Yes, they have chosen to ‘like’ your page, but this
doesn’t give you licence to hit them with offers, promotions, new products or a
statement about how great your company is. A ‘like’ is someone giving you a pass
into their living room – value it! What about the people who don’t like your page –
they won’t see these posts. This is precisely the point. Unless there’s a competition
going, no one is going to share self-promotional rubbish over social media to their
audience. This is exactly why companies resting on their ‘offline’ brand are
particularly bad at growing their online audience.
So what, exactly, constitutes a self-promotional tweet or post? Anything that is
more promotional than interaction and value-adding. Use the content matrix as
both a macro and micro guide. The blend of your content, where your blob sits in
the triangle, should be on the right-hand side, but remember that this is an
aggregate of numerous posts dotted all over the triangle. Some updates will be
closer to the centre and maybe one in twenty posts might be way over to the self-
promotional corner. The other 19 need to be at least as interactive or value-adding
as they are ‘promotional’.
 
The content matrix: a deeper analysis

Essentially, our social media content matrix is a triangle, but actually; it’s a

Reulaux triangle (very complex, we know). This is because it is derived from three
interlocking circles, each representing the three type of content we can create over
social media. Extending the content matrix, we can see how each type is defined
and contributes to the matrix. See the image below.
You’ll notice that the centre of the diagram below is Cook’s content matrix. This is
because, inherently, anything that you can possibly post over social media is, to
some degree, a mixture of all three types; value-adding, self-promotional and
interaction. Imagine the most non-promotional, interactive tweet to a follower of
your company’s Twitter account. It is purely interaction, BUT, it has your
company logo next to it (self-promotional) and it will be adding value to that
individual follower, maybe others purely out of the fact a company is conversing
with a civilian.
On the other hand, the most shamelessly self-promotional Facebook post can be
responded to – it is up there for anyone to interact with. And given your company
has genuine products or services to offer, the post is likely to offer someone some
value if they’re in your target audience. It might even be so shameless it raises an
eyebrow or makes someone laugh out of pity(!)
Alarm bells might be ringing if someone has been telling you that the only social
network your business needs to be on is Facebook when apparently Twitter is the
only social network.
 
All the other ‘social networks’ (including Facebook) are content platforms. They
enable the company or brand to enter the online social sphere of their target
audience but only on Twitter can they be truly engaged and conversed with.
Remember, you cannot force your Facebook page on your audience – you can’t
post on individuals’ walls.
 
Self-promotional advertising channels have always existed without the scope to
interact in a two-way relationship with the consumer. This is why there is a
temptation to use social media platforms as another channel with which to
bombard one’s target audience with corporate messages and promotional garbage.
This also explains why some marketers are a lot more comfortable using Facebook
(a content platform), rather than Twitter (a conversation platform).
Other content platforms like Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube offer much the
same: channels to post promotional material – pictures and videos – with only
marginal scope to interact with consumers, at least, on the company’s terms. As
traditional marketers are most comfortable in the self-promotional circle of the
diagram, it makes sense that their content blend is going to be skewed to the
bottom left of the content matrix.

There are, of course, examples of channels that will fit into the space represented
by the two overlapping circles of self-promotional and value adding. Really funny
or entertaining TV ads are going to be value-adding. Competitions and prize
giveaways, likewise, promote the brand but add value to consumers by giving them
a chance to win something. The same is true for advertorials; they’re providing
information but are, equally, selling something. The self-promotion/interaction
overlap, however, is relatively new in terms of a two-way relationship, most of
which will fall into the central content matrix because they will occur over social
media.
 
The best examples of traditional means of interaction are not marketing as much as
selling. Telesales, door to door selling, car salesmen all require communication and
sales skills but are very focused on a specific outcome – conversions – a one-way
type of self-promoting interaction.
 
The ‘desired’ content blend is right on the edge of the green self-promotional circle
– barely recognisable as self-promotion (probably no more than the logo sat next to
the post) but sitting firmly within the red value-adding and blue interaction circles.
 
And, for your interest, what happens in the overlap between interaction and value
adding, naturally, has nothing to do with companies; it is outside the self-
promotion circle. This is where a phone call between friends takes place. Even the
most value-adding, interactive social media account (pure customer service) is
going to be self-promotional as long as it has a company logo beside it.
So what’s the bottom line?

The key is to think of social media content as the foundation of your strategy
and online presence. Use it to amuse, inform and update your audience and it
will grow – find or create something really shareable and you might grow it
very quickly! We know that well-run competitions grow brands effectively as
does effectively targeted Facebook promoted posts, but have you unlocked the
power of interaction?
 
Enjoyed our blog? Like our social media content matrix? Cool, let us know! 
tags: social media content, social media content matrix