Category: Social

Social

Boosted Posts Vs. Facebook Ads: How It Works and Why You Should Advertise

Post author By Rallio
Post date March 12, 2021

Advertising on Facebook and other social media channels helps you to build brand awareness, generate leads and grow your following. If you’re not familiar with boosted posts and other types of ads, this article will help you understand how it works and why you should consider doing it for your business.

Why advertise on Facebook? As we discuss in this article:

When you have a business Facebook page, the content you publish doesn’t necessarily get seen by all your followers. Even people who have chosen to follow your page might initially see your content organically, but they won’t continue to see it unless:

You regularly post engaging content that interests them and inspires them to interact with it; and
You pay to get it seen. Yes, Facebook is a “pay to play” platform.

This winning combination of great content, coupled with ad spend, increases the likelihood of making your content visible in newsfeeds.

Boosting is a form of advertising that differs from Facebook ads, and each ad type has its own unique objectives. Let’s review the basics of each so you can decide when to boost and when a different kind of Facebook ad might be more appropriate.

Boosted Posts

With boosted posts, you take a post from your page’s timeline and pay to expose it to an audience of your choosing. You can also create a new post and click “boost” instead of “publish” to boost a new piece of content.

You can think of boosting as the simplest way to advertise your content. You can customize your boosts for various goals — such as boosting website traffic, getting more calls or messages, or getting more leads through fillable forms.

Once you boost a post, it will show up in your audience’s newsfeed as an ad. You can also choose Instagram as an ad placement for a boosted post.

To boost a post, you’ll need to know:

The target audience you want to reach
Your max budget for the course of the campaign
The duration of time you want to run your boosted ad

Boosted posts are ads in the sense that they require an advertising budget. However, there are some differences between boosted posts and other types of Facebook ads you should know. For starters, boosted posts are not created in Ads Manager and don’t have all the same customization features as a Facebook ad. Still, they can be quite effective at boosting brand awareness, increasing engagement and follower count, and showcasing the personality behind your brand via local content.

Facebook Ads

Because they’re created in Facebook’s Ads Manager, Facebook ads provide more advanced customization and placement options. You may choose to select placements in side ads, Messenger ads, Instagram Stories, instant articles and Audience Network. In addition, you can customize the look and feel of your ad with various formatting solutions.

Lastly, you’ll have advanced targeting capabilities. While boosted posts allow you to choose interests, age and gender for your ad targets, Facebook ads also let you create overlapping audience types, lookalike audiences and more.

Note that with Facebook ads, in addition to some of the more advanced features, you can use retargeted ads to reconnect with certain users who have already shown an interest in your product or service. These might be people who interacted with your brand in some way, either on or off Facebook, including those who have:

Interacted with your Facebook page or Instagram page
Shared their email with you and joined your customer list
Watched your videos
Engaged with your Facebook events in some way
Viewed or interacted with your website

Learn more: The Difference Between Boosted Posts and Facebook Ads

When to Boost Versus Use Facebook Ads

Both boosted posts and Facebook ads should have their place in your advertising budget. Boosted posts are great for quickly exposing a post to more people in newsfeeds than you would organically.

Oftentimes, it’s best to boost high-performing, hyper-local posts that have already earned engagements such as comments, shares, likes and clicks. Other goals might require you creating an ad in Ads Manager.

When you create an ad on Facebook, the app will help you choose your ad type based on your goals, such as:

Get more leads
Get more bookings
Get more messages or calls
Get more website visitors

This takes some of the guesswork out of knowing which type of ad to use.

New to Facebook Advertising? Jump Into Boosting

If you’re new to Facebook advertising, boosted posts are a great place to start. It’s fairly simple to get started with boosting and start seeing results quickly, and it’s especially effective for newer pages that want to increase their following. Once you have more likes on your page, the more advanced ad tools might make more sense in tandem with your boosting campaigns.

With any type of Facebook ads, you’ll need to set up an ad account for your business page to start boosting. Then you can pick which content you want to promote, such as:

Real photos or videos from your location, including the owners, employees or customers, behind-the-scenes content and other authentic, hyper-local posts
Events you are hosting at your location
Job postings if you have them
Photos or videos of anything new at your location

Once your boosted posts appear in newsfeeds and earn engagements, your page will be deemed more “relevant,” meaning it’ll become more visible to your followers as well as their friends and people who aren’t following you yet.

General Guidelines for Boosted Posts

To further amplify the results of your boosted posts, follow these guidelines:

Avoid text-heavy posts. Facebook might reject your ad or limit its exposure if you have too many words. (Read this article to learn more.)
Be as specific as possible when choosing your audience. Make sure your audience includes people who are likely to engage with your content based on their location, gender, age or interests.
Limit the duration of your ad to five to seven days to avoid having your post decline in performance.
Continually monitor the performance of your ads throughout your campaigns. Make any necessary tweaks to better target the people you want to reach.

Be sure to check out our Social Spots video, featuring our pal Roscoe, for a quick breakdown of Facebook boosting. Need some extra guidance and the right social media technology to help automate and manage your social media marketing, visit rallio.com and request a demo to view all your options.

Rallio

Rallio is a leading technology platform that combines sophisticated social media management, artificial intelligence, and dynamic employee advocacy tools. Specializing in franchising while also serving a variety of other industries, Rallio enhances the social ecosystem, ensuring cohesive brand messaging and effective digital engagement. Renowned for its commitment to excellence and broad industry application, Rallio is the technology of choice for numerous top-tier brands seeking to optimize their online presence.

Tags social media marketing

Social

Content Writing 101: How to Write Emails, Headlines and Captions That Get Results

Post author By Rallio
Post date March 6, 2021

Content writing is an art and a science. The art comes in the form of beautiful imagery and word wizardry. The science comes in the form of carefully crafted phrases, written in just the right combination of characters.

Even the greatest email promotions of all time won’t get opened without a great subject line. The most engaging photos fall flat on social media without thoughtful, engaging captions. And even the most articulate of prose won’t be read without an intriguing headline.

Staring at the screen and scratching your head won’t magically allow words to materialize on the page. Throwing together a careless email, caption or headline is a quick way to lose out on readership. So why do the words on a page or a screen matter so much? And how can you improve your content writing skills?

Content Writing 101

The goal of any marketing piece is to inspire a reader into action. There can be all kinds of different actions you want from your audience, such as:

Open an email
Click on a link
Share your content with friends
Read your article and take various actions based on the content
Follow you
Revisit your content because it’s just that great

These are just a few examples of actions your readers might take when you have well-written marketing messages. The way you word your emails, captions and headlines can help you guide your readers toward the desired action. Your content writing should be a reflection of the various marketing goals you have.

If you tend to get stuck trying to put together attention-grabbing subject lines, headlines and social media captions, just know you’re not alone. Even seasoned writers get writer’s block. Plus, marketing messages are tricky — you could lose your reader before they’ve even opened your email, for example.

The good news is that you can get better at content writing with practice. Our tips below will start you off on the road to compelling emails, headlines and social media captions.

Email Subject Lines

Quick — check the number of unopened emails in your inbox. Is it 10? 100? 10,000? The fact is, many emails sit unopened or get deleted simply because the subject line wasn’t enticing enough.

There are many different ways to structure your email subject lines in order to get people to open them. The style you choose depends on the goal of your campaign as well as whether you have an existing relationship with the customer or prospect.

Informational — Straightforward, no-nonsense subject lines are used to convey important information such as order updates, shipping notifications, a privacy notice or other details that are specific to that user. Example: “Your order has shipped”
Funny — A well-placed quip or play on words can help your email stand out from the crowd. Example: “Our eggs are hard to beat” for a breakfast restaurant.
Attention-grabbing — Used sparingly, shock value can spice up your subject lines, but proceed with caution. Avoid offensive or incendiary language in favor of intriguing text that makes a reader pause and want to open the email. Example: “Just give up” to promote a coaching program that helps people give up refined sugar.
Short and sweet — A single word or just a few words make your subject lines easy to digest in an overcrowded inbox. Example: “Be brave” for a seminar featuring a prominent author.
Numbered — Our brains are drawn to digits, so anytime you throw a number into an email subject line, it’s more likely to draw attention. Example: “10 signs you’re a 90s kid.”
Personalized — Great for remarketing and local offers, personalized subject lines work well for targeting people who looked at your products or services but didn’t buy, or for attracting your local audience. They can also tap into the “scarcity factor” for people who don’t want to miss out. Example: “Last chance: This offer won’t last” or “Your cart is calling” for abandoned carts; throw in a discount code to encourage the user to return to your site. Note: You can also use names to personalize emails, but avoid overuse as these emails may be viewed as spam.

A few final thoughts on email subject lines:

Use A/B testing to try out different subject lines as well as variations on initial caps/no caps with your text. Your open rates will tell you what works best with your audience.
Don’t go overboard on your character count. Around 50 characters or fewer is a good guideline.
Write several different subject lines before settling on the one or two you like. Again, you can A/B test different versions.

Headlines for Blogs, Website Pages and Marketing Materials

Many of the same guidelines used for email subject lines apply to headlines, too. Like your subject lines, your headlines are one of the first things people see if they’re viewing your blog or website, or if they’re seeing a link preview on social media.

According to CoSchedule, eight out 10 people will read a headline, while only two out of 10 people will click through. That means your headlines need to grab their attention right away in order to give your content a chance of being read.

To get started with headline writing, walk through the steps below. Above all, commit to doing a lot of headline writing before you decide on the one you’ll use for any particular piece of content.

Take a look at the headlines on some of your favorite articles you’ve read. Which words drew you into the article? Write down the words or numbers that caught your attention.
Write down 10 to 20 possible headlines for your content. Walk away for a bit and let your list sit. Take a literal walk if needed. Come back with fresh eyes, and cross out any headlines you immediately know won’t work. Now choose your top five.
If you have a writing team, float your headline ideas to them and see which ones they like best. If you don’t, that’s OK, too. Pick your favorite and publish your post.
Now you can test out different versions of your headline on social media. Tweet out your article using both the published headline and some of your alternates to see what kind of traffic you get.

The process above is a great way to get started with headline writing. The more you practice, the better you’ll get, and the more you’ll understand what resonates with your audience.

Learn more: 73 Easy Ways To Write A Headline That Will Reach Your Readers

Social Media Captions

And now for social media captions. The captions you write will vary based on the intention of the post. An inspirational, “straight from the heart” post might be longer than a video post that relies more on people viewing the video than reading your caption, for example.

The advantage of social media marketing is that you have more of a “complete package” to present to your readers — with engaging visuals that capture their attention as they scroll. Captions also make you more discoverable because you can incorporate hashtags that help people find you.

Again, the more you write captions, the better you’ll become at it. Follow these guidelines as you write:

Identify the “why” behind your post. Is it to create a connection with your readers? Do you have a specific action you want them to take? Do you want to showcase your personality? The words you choose should reflect the intention of the post.
Encourage interaction by asking open-ended questions. Imagine sitting down with a friend and chatting. Be conversational so your audience is more likely to post their replies. A photo of your green smoothie becomes instantly more engaging if you ask, “Is it just me, or do green smoothies taste better when the sun is shining?”
Include calls to action sparingly. Not every post should ask your readers to take action. How irritating is it to see a brand constantly ask you to “click here” or “download this”? Instead, sprinkle in these posts amid your inspirational, entertaining or informative posts — which should comprise the bulk of your content.

Learn more: 7 Tips for Creating Engaging Social Media Captions

The More Content Writing You Do, the Better You’ll Get

Not every single thing you write is going to be award-worthy, and that’s OK. Content writing takes trial and error and lots of practice. Over time, you’ll get to know your audience and how they respond to your content, and you can make any tweaks along the way.

Make sure you’re regularly reviewing your analytics to see how your words are landing. Rallio’s SaaS platform helps you pull in insights from various platforms and see how your content is performing. To see how it works and request a demo, head over to rallio.com.

Rallio

Social

3 Steps to Knock Your Product Launch Out of the Park on Social Media

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 22, 2021

It’s the moment you’ve been waiting for — you’re finally ready to launch your product. Whether you have a brand-new startup or a seasoned business, the success of your product launch depends largely on how you market it.

Social media plays a huge role in whether your product launch will be a major success — or a total flop. Among the many mediums available to enable consumers to discover new brands, social media gives your brand exposure to people who otherwise never would have heard of you — all while they’re casually scrolling through their feeds.

It’s not unlike TV advertising in that people who might be simply watching their favorite show suddenly get interrupted by an ad that catches their attention. Self-cleaning toilets? Brow growth serum? Personalized vitamins? Throw out an ad to the right audience at the right time, and suddenly people start to think that’s a product they need in their lives now.

According to Global Web Index: “TV ads lead the field when it comes to brand discovery, cited by 36% of our respondents as the main way they find out about new products and services. But TV is even more important than this figure implies because, unlike search engines, it doesn’t rely on any existing need or interest in the product or its category.”

Now, consider the ways that social media mimics TV ads: “To some extent, brand discovery on social channels resembles the linear, semi-random nature of TV ads, which are interwoven throughout the content,” notes GWI. “By using social media and online display advertising, direct-to-consumer brands are reproducing many of the top strengths TV has enjoyed.”

Indeed, the nature of brand discovery has changed over the years. The numbers of people finding brands through recommendations or comments on social media, along with updates on brands’ social media pages, has been slowly climbing, says GWI. Take a look at the numbers:

Cost-effective, scalable, and readily able to connect directly with consumers, social media has the distinct advantage of immediacy over other mediums. See an ad for a product that catches your interest, and you can tap on it, maybe even purchase it on the spot from your phone.

TV is starting to integrate this kind of interactivity, too — with QR codes and interactive experiences making their way onto people’s TV screens. However, there simply isn’t another medium like social media that lets you see what your friends are liking, sharing, commenting on, and talking about in their posts and stories. Nor is there any other medium that lets you talk directly to followers and prospects via comments, direct messages and online reviews.

Get Your Product Launch Right

As you can see, social media needs to be an integral part of your product launch plans. Ignore social media, and you’re ignoring an opportunity to make your brand a household name with your target audience. And if you’re too hasty or fail to think through your product launch strategy, you risk having your message get lost in the crowd.

With our steps below, you’ll ensure your product launch is successful and propels you into growth.

Step 1: Create a content calendar that maps out your product launch timeline.

With all the moving parts that go along with a great social media marketing strategy, it’s essential that you organize everything in one central calendar. This way, you can stay on track as you march toward your launch date and make sure your entire team knows what content is needed and what kind of deadlines you have. Some of the things that should go on your content calendar include:

Product photos and explainer videos
Product descriptions for your website
Social media captions for various platforms
Email campaigns announcing your product launch
Ad copy with calls to action
Blog posts about your product
Pay-per-click advertising
In-store or online events

Assuming you aren’t going to handle all of the above yourself, make sure you have a team prepared to tackle these tasks. If you can’t or don’t want to hire a team, be willing to outsource the work. Rallio also gives you the technology needed to automate and organize your social media marketing in one central dashboard.

Step 2: Create a buzz.

Leading up to your launch, your social media should get people excited about your new product. Phrases like “coming soon” and “stay tuned” should be a regular part of your social media vernacular.

At the same time, maintain a sense of mystery. Don’t give away all the details, but rather hint at what you have in store. Countdown posts, product previews, stories, Reels, giveaways and contests are great ways to give a glimpse of what’s to come.

Contests and giveaways (with clearly spelled out terms and conditions) can be particularly effective at building engagement. Ask your followers to like, comment and tag friends to be entered to win your product, and you’ll quickly extend your reach to new followers. Just don’t forget to set a deadline to enter and pick a winner!

Step 3: Run social ads.

First, some background on the current state of social media advertising. Apple is rolling out privacy changes in iOS 14 requiring users to opt in to ad tracking across different apps and websites. Google is weighing a similar option for Android devices.

In response, Facebook has now announced plans to prompt users to opt in to ad tracking in order to have more relevant ads served up to them and “to help people make a more informed decision.”

Apple says it wants to provide privacy; Facebook thinks it can provide both privacy and personalized ads. If you look at the growth of Facebook ad revenue over the past few years, you can see that Facebook has a vested interest in maintaining its advertiser base:

Rather than panic about the changes, it’s important to take control as an advertiser. Here are a few things you can do to optimize your campaigns without relying entirely on the Facebook tracking pixel:

Run web-visit and lead-ad campaigns. Use your website’s internal tools to track whether a conversion occurred as a result of your Facebook ads.
Work in reverse, too. Capture leads on your website by requiring users to provide their email address in order to move through the sales funnel. You can then upload that information into Facebook to create a custom audience for your ads and remarketing purposes.
Explore advertising possibilities on other platforms like LinkedIn, Google and Bing.
Build relationships with your followers so they begin seeking out your content. Be hyper-responsive to their comments, direct messages and online reviews. The more you engage with them, the more they’ll engage with you.
Use employee advocacy to get your employees involved in sharing your content. When they share content on their personal pages, it’s more likely to be seen and engaged with than content from a business page. Our Rallio Activate employee advocacy platform is the exact solution you need to address any seismic changes to Facebook advertising. See it in action here with our client Pet Supplies Plus.

Get Excited About Your Product Launch

There’s a lot of work that goes into getting a new product to market. With the help of social media and the right technology tools from Rallio, you can make sure you hit the launch out of the park.

Before, during and after your product launch, keep track of your progress toward the KPIs you’ve set. Make any necessary adjustments to ensure you’re building excitement, growing your following and meeting your sales goals.

Once the product launch is complete, don’t forget about all the hard work you put in. Keep in touch with your followers so you continue building a relationship with them. Over time, their loyalty will contribute to the success of future product launches.

Rallio

Tags branding

Social

Small-Business Technology Roundup: How Rallio Can Help You Run Smarter

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 18, 2021

Technology has changed the way companies conduct themselves today, allowing for greater efficiency and fewer headaches in all areas of business. One of the fastest-growing areas of technology is digital marketing, something that all businesses need to familiarize themselves with in order to succeed.

Rallio’s small-business technology tools take the guesswork out of your digital marketing plan — helping you run smarter and meet your goals. Take a look at the various options we offer, plus the numerous benefits, and you’ll see why we’re the technology provider of choice for hundreds of business owners nationwide.

Consider the Possibilities With Rallio’s Small-Business Technology Suite

With social media, email marketing, search engine marketing, pay per click and more, digital marketing has expanded the ability for businesses of all sizes to spread the word. We live in a world where social media and internet usage is at an all-time high, especially as we continue to navigate through pandemic times. And for many small businesses, technology has saved them during these challenging times.

With digital marketing, businesses have multiple ways to communicate with customers and prospects even when they’re not seeing them face to face. Rallio simplifies the entire process with our award-winning suite of small-business technology platforms, including:

Rallio Dashboard

Have one centralized place where all of your brand assets live. Syndicate, publish or schedule social content to your entire brand or a subset of locations. View analytics, respond to reviews and engagements, run ad campaigns, and control your brand message from one dashboard with one login.

Rallio Local

Pair our dashboard with our Rallio Local services to free yourself up from some of the many responsibilities in running a successful business. In recent years, social media and reputation management have become critical items for your success. The Rallio Local team of social gurus will automate the process of creating ridiculously engaging, hyper-local content; make sure local targeted audiences actually see and engage with that content; and respond to all your social comments and online reviews.

Rallio Activate

Leverage the power of your employees to reach your customers like never before. With Rallio Activate, your employees become your built-in brand ambassadors. Create reward programs to your exact specifications, and incentivize your workforce to submit their own images and videos for brand content or share your message across their own pages.

Business Listings

With just a few clicks, you can manage your digital profiles across global business locations, reaching over 98% of consumers across top media channels. Promote your brand across social media, traditional search, mobile marketing and voice search. Deliver a more engaging customer experience by updating your imagery and logos. Instantly update your key business content across locations, and control and optimize your data across third-party digital platforms. Measure and optimize the channels that are impacting your customer acquisition, and improve your brand discoverability and search rankings across your brand.

Revv

REVV is an innovative service designed to help you increase your positive social reviews and reduce negative reviews while improving your overall brand reputation online through a one-question post-sale survey sent to recent customers. Our platform generates a quick post-sale text survey to your customers so they can provide feedback about their experience in your store.

Customers who respond positively are prompted to leave a review and linked directly to that store’s Google, Facebook or Yelp page. Watch your brand reputation increase, along with the volume of positive reviews for your stores! If a customer responds to your survey with a rating of 3 or below, they will be prompted to leave a comment and request further assistance. Your team is alerted via email of the poor experience, and the customer can be contacted directly before they post a negative review about your company!

How Rallio Small-Business Technology Helps Small Business

If you were to implement our suite of small-business technology platforms and services, the benefits go beyond having access to advanced digital marketing tools. Consider the many ways these platforms can help you in other areas of your business:

Customer service — The Rallio inbox pulls all your comments, questions, reviews and engagements into one central location. Because you don’t have to log in to multiple platforms, you’re able to get back to customers more quickly, handle any customer service issues, and respond to positive feedback to thank your customers for their business. Over time, this translates into greater overall brand loyalty and brand awareness.
Company culture — By getting your employees involved in your branding via Rallio Activate, you’re able to build morale and grow your company culture. Activate makes it easy to reward and incentivize your employees for helping to share their experiences with your brand.
Greater efficiency and productivity — Needless to say, our small-business technology streamlines and automates processes you might otherwise be doing manually. Think about the time savings involved with updating your business listings in a few clicks, easily responding to your customers and followers from one dashboard, and managing and scheduling your assets from a single dashboard that eliminates the need to log in to multiple platforms.
Greater engagement across the board — Rallio is all about “rallying” around brands and bringing people together. Our small-business technology suite is designed to get everyone — from executive teams to individual small-business owners — engaged in using technology to make life easier, more productive and more fun.

If you’re looking for smarter, faster small-business technology and services for your business, we would love to chat with you. Schedule some time on the calendar with us, and we’ll walk you through the best solutions for your needs.

Rallio

Tags social media marketing

Social

How to Create a Culture of Employee Advocacy

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 13, 2021

You may have seen some of our recent articles on employee advocacy and how it can transform your team members into brand ambassadors. When implemented effectively, employee advocacy is, indeed, an effective way to spread brand awareness and broaden your impact on social media. Before you begin implementing an employee advocacy program, however, it’s important that you foster a culture of employee advocacy.

With this culture, your employees become willing participants in ambassadorship. A culture of advocacy will motivate employees to speak positively about your brand on social media. If you lack that kind of culture, they may be reluctant to share anything about your brand.

Why Does Employee Advocacy Matter?

Consider the ripple effect of creating a culture of employee advocacy, and you can see how important it is to foster this kind of environment at your company:

If your employees feel satisfied and engaged, they’re more likely to do great work. They’ll have good things to say about you, both internally amongst themselves and externally on their personal social media profiles.
If they post positively about your brand, their posts come across as believable and authentic, more so than your own branded content. Convince & Convert reports that a recommendation from a friend or family member makes 83% of Americans more likely to purchase that particular product or service.
Furthermore, if employees do great work, they’ll deliver an extraordinary customer experience by way of great products, great services and great customer support.
If your customers have an extraordinary experience, and if they see posts that are believable and authentic, they’ll be loyal to your brand — becoming brand ambassadors themselves.
If both your employees and customers are happy, they’ll continue spreading the word, extending your reach and engagement exponentially. You’ll gain new followers, new customers, and even new employees when you’re actively recruiting.

It’s one big happy cycle that you need to have working for you in order to experience ongoing success. Can you see how important a culture of employee advocacy is now?

A Culture of Employee Advocacy Starts With Education

If your employees aren’t actively advocating for your brand on social media, it doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t want to. In some cases, they may simply lack the proper language and knowledge to share confidently. In order to inspire confidence, provide them with the tools they need. Here are some key points to keep in mind:

Whether you’re onboarding new employees or working to educate existing staff, make sure you’re communicating your company’s core values and goals. Create internal programs that train your employees on your mission and vision, your product offerings and your competitive differentiators.
Remember, it’s not just your sales staff that needs this information; every single employee should understand what you stand for (so they don’t “fall” when trying to communicate about your brand).
The company’s “About Us” statement, which typically lives on your website and in any kind of communications about your brand, should be in writing and easily available to employees. Take the time to craft a company description that’s easy to understand and readily translated into talking points.
Live your mission by fostering communication between team members and their direct supervisors. Regular check-ins can help to encourage questions and clarifications as well as address any challenges that employees might be experiencing.

Use Technology to Your Advantage

Once you’ve adequately educated your team about your mission, values and goals, the next step is setting them up for success. It’s not enough to have a culture of employee advocacy; you also need to equip your employees with the best technology to streamline the advocacy process.

While your employees are naturally using technology already to post on social media, you can improve your results even more with a technology like Rallio Activate. With Activate, not only can your employees become brand ambassadors, but you can also create reward programs to your exact specifications. You’ll have the ability to incentivize your workforce to submit their own images and videos for brand content or share your message across their own pages.

Put another way, a culture of employee advocacy is necessary for your advocacy program to work — but incentivizing employees will give them even more of a reason to pull out their phones and snap a few photos.

Here’s how it works:

You incentivize employees with rewards programs that you create and collect assets into your brand’s image library.
Employees are able to submit their own photos and videos to earn points, as well as publish your brand-approved content on their personal profiles.
Your employees can take advantage of the available programs to start earning rewards. They’ll receive a push notification when a new program is available and reminders to participate before the program ends.

Simple as that!

To get an idea of how this process works for a real business, read through our case study we conducted with one of our clients, Pet Supplies Plus (PSP). Since the rollout of their limited mobile logins over two years ago on Rallio Activate, 3,395 PSP team members have been activated, equating to 173,513 images and videos submitted. Ultimately, these uploads have resulted in over 2,541,965 social media engagements (such as likes, comments, clicks and shares) from posts, which leveraged those assets that PSP otherwise would have not received.

If you’re curious how advocacy can work for your particular business, schedule a no-obligation demo to learn more. Just choose a spot on the calendar and we’ll make sure you get all the information you need.

In the meantime, why not start fostering a culture of employee advocacy at your company, starting with the guidelines above? You’ll be well on your way to a successful advocacy program and ready to make use of our technology for your own brand.

“Customers will never love a company until its employees love it first.” — Simon Sinek

Rallio

Tags employee advocacy

Social

Top 5 Social Media Tips for Small Businesses

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 10, 2021

With our recent addition of Rallio Local for Small Business division at Rallio, we’ve been working with small businesses to help them optimize their social media pages. More often than not, we offer the same social media tips for small businesses over and over again.

Most small-business owners are so busy running their companies that they don’t have much time left over for social media marketing. Rallio helps them wear fewer hats and make a greater impact on social media. With our social media tips, technology and teamwork (hello, alliteration!), we’ve helped hundreds of business owners use social media to their advantage.

The following social media tips represent the five most common opportunities for greater success on social media.

#1 Post Local Content

Great social media marketers have local content at the forefront of their marketing efforts. As we discuss in this article: “The key element that makes local social media, well, local, is that it shows the real side of your business.”

Local posts consist of snapshots of the owners, employees, customers, product recommendations, how-tos, and other authentic-feeling images and videos.

It’s the difference between a post with a stock photo or a sales graphic versus a real photo or a video of a team member. When you see it, it’s instantly more relatable and engaging than something that feels like you’re being sold to.

Having local content on your page improves your engagement rates and reach with your target audience. As you post this content and boost it, you’ll ensure more of your content gets seen than it would with organic reach alone.

Make sure you:

Post real images and videos of your team, your products, your customers and your location.
Avoid stock photos.
If you’re a franchisee receiving corporate branded content, be sure you are also posting local content at least three or four times a week.
Read 31 Days of Social Media Content Ideas for more ideas.

Read the post: 7 Habits of Highly Successful Social Media Marketers

#2 Engage Your Employees as Brand Advocates

One of the fastest-growing trends in social media is employee advocacy, in which employees become loyal ambassadors for your brand. With more and more companies adopting employee advocacy programs, you might be wondering what types of content your employees should be posting for you.

Although branded content has its place, it should not be the bulk of what’s shared via employee advocates.

On the contrary, it’s the unpolished, unbranded types of content that will earn the greatest engagement on social media. This content showcases the authentic, human side of your business and is more likely to earn the trust and affection of your audience. Moreover, these types of content are more likely to be shared by your employees on their personal pages.

Own a coffee shop? The barista behind the counter will resonate more with your audience than a branded photo of coffee beans. It’s that simple. No matter what type of business you have, you need hyper-local content of your team members and their typical “day in the life” photos at work.

As employees post about your company on their personal pages, they’re doing more than just generating greater engagement for your accounts. They’re also actively contributing to the building of positive sentiment about your brand. The more that prospective customers and future team members see this content, the more they begin to view your company as likeable, trustworthy, and even socially and environmentally responsible under the right circumstances.

Read the post: The 4 Types of Content Your Employees Should Post for You

#3 Respond to Online Reviews

The cost of ignoring customer service issues can be huge. Nothing will tarnish your online reputation faster than reviews without responses from the brand, comments and messages that get ignored, and poorly crafted responses to customer questions or complaints.

Your response time matters, too. Consumers expect rapid answers — just as rapid as if they picked up the phone and called. Within minutes is ideal if you have the bandwidth, but you should at least be responding within 24 hours.

With a system for responding to customer inquiries, you can handle their requests quickly and build customer loyalty. You’ll also make it known that you’re a trustworthy brand when you post public responses to reviews, questions or complaints.

Read the post: 4 Social Media Marketing Lessons Learned in 2020

#4 Outsource Anything You Can’t Do Yourself

Here at Rallio, we’re on social media all day, every day. We live, breathe, eat and sleep social media. That’s because it’s our business to do so — just as it’s your business to live, breathe, eat and sleep your own business.

So if you’re busy running your own business, it’s likely that you don’t have the time to manage your social media. You also might not particularly want to manage this task, much less become an expert in it.

That’s all OK, because when you outsource, you can hire people who are experts in social media like Rallio. You don’t have to waste time or resources on something that draws you away from your core functions as a business owner.

Rallio, an Entrepreneur Top Franchise Supplier and an Inc.com fastest-growing company, has earned nationwide recognition for its service of the franchise sector, from corporate down to the franchisee level. With its new Rallio Local for Small Business division, Rallio is able to lend its expertise to small businesses that are independently owned and operated.

Read the post: Should You Outsource Your Small-Business Social Media? 4 Compelling Reasons It Makes Sense

#5 Use Technology to Automate

Rallio’s solutions include a social media management platform where users can access and manage all their social media accounts, in one central dashboard with a single login. Along with a mobile app, the platform enables clients to upload and schedule content, implement employee advocacy programs, reply to comments, messages and reviews, and much more.

Basically, Rallio makes small-business social media management a much smoother, easier process. Rather than having to log in to multiple platforms with different logins, you can simply log in to your Rallio Dashboard.

You’ll also avoid letting anything slip through the cracks like a negative customer review or an important sales lead. Everything will be in your inbox to review and respond to.

Read the post: Should You Outsource Your Small-Business Social Media? 4 Compelling Reasons It Makes Sense

Want More Social Media Tips? Get in Touch With Rallio

If you’re looking for more social media tips, we’re here to help. Our Rallio Local for Small Business division is an extension of our existing social media management and marketing solutions. As a top-ranked provider of social media technology, employee advocacy and local social media services, we’re thrilled to be offering our all-in-one social media solutions to small, independently owned businesses.

If you’re ready to outsource your small-business social media and focus on other parts of your business, contact localsales@rallio.com, and visit www.rallio.com/getlocal or www.rallio.com.

Rallio

Tags social media marketing

Social

Why Employee Advocacy Works for Even the Most Unusual Businesses

Post author By Rallio
Post date February 5, 2021

If you’re familiar with employee advocacy, then you might be aware of some of the benefits. By engaging your employees as brand ambassadors on social media, you’re able to increase engagement and reach for your brand. Employees who share both their own images and videos, along with those of your brand, help to spread the word — often more organically and effectively than brands sharing content from their own pages.

That being said, we know there are still companies that are reluctant to implement an employee advocacy program. Whether they aren’t familiar with the concept, or they don’t want to devote resources toward it, or they don’t believe it works for their particular industry, there are businesses that haven’t embraced the concept of employee advocacy.

As such, we’ve devoted this blog post to explaining how employee advocacy can work for any type of business — no matter how odd. It might just get you thinking how an employee advocacy program could benefit your business.

Note that the businesses mentioned in this article are for example purposes only and not to point out the existence or lack thereof of any type of employee advocacy program. Rather, we’re simply demonstrating that there are, in fact, lots of unusual businesses out there — and having some fun with describing how we’d approach employee advocacy if this were our own business.

Custom Spuds

Who knew there was a demand for potatoes with custom messages on them, sent in the mail to special someones? Potato Parcel did. That’s right — the company, which touts its one-of-a-kind potatoes as “The Most Unexpected Gift in the Mail,” will imprint custom messages or images on a potato and deliver it to anyone you’d like. They even got Shark Tank on board with their concept.

The company claims “100% laughter or confusion guaranteed.” Sounds about right.

Kinda makes you want some French fries, no?

But seriously though, imagine the employee advocacy posts for this one. Let’s say James from Potato Parcel sends his girlfriend a Valentine’s Day Potato Bundle. He films the exact moment she opens the gift and posts this on his Instagram Stories, tagging @potatoparcel.

Now James’ friends see the Story and think it’s hilarious. They start thinking about potential potato recipients. Next thing you know, they’re following @potatoparcel and ordering a Potato Birthday Bundle for their buddy.

The more potato-promoting people on the Potato Parcel team, the more laughter and confusion will ensue. And of course, the more Potato Parcel will grow.

Eyewear for Your Fur Buddy

In a world where dogs are family and not just pets, it should come as no huge surprise that Doggles exist. Imagine playing a game of Frisbee on a sunny day and having your pup struggle to make a catch because the sun is in his eyes. Or imagine having a dog who needs prescription eyewear so she’s not bumping into furniture all day long.

Here’s where Doggles (goggles for dogs) come in.

This concept screams “social,” and we’d venture to guess they have team members whose pups are proud owners of several pairs of Doggles. All they need to do is head out to the park and snap some photos and videos as their fur babies run around wearing Doggles, nailing every Frisbee catch. Or capture the moment their vision-challenged pooch slips on prescription Doggles for the first time.

Tag Doggles in the post, and there you have it: lots more people seeing Doggles and deciding they better get some nice eyewear for their doggos. It’s the content we didn’t know we needed — and we’re soooo here for it.

Employee advocacy is easy when you have a cool product like Doggles. Judging from their Facebook page, people — and their pups — are loving them, too.

Weddings on Wheels

Nowadays, nearly everything you could ever want can be ordered online and delivered to your door. Whether you’ve got a craving for wings or, hey, you want to order a complete wedding on wheels, you don’t have to look far to find what you need in just a few clicks.

Las Vegas Wedding Wagon, for one, will come directly to the happy couple with a wedding officiant, a photographer and even a witness if needed. Starting at $129, the Wedding Wagon is a convenient, no-frills option for couples that want to avoid the high costs and stress of planning a big wedding.

The @lasvegasweddingwagon Instagram shows how easy it can be to get hitched and still keep it classy. Imagine how beautiful this Red Rock Canyon ceremony must have been for this couple.

For the team members who make these events happen, there’s an opportunity to capture special moments on camera and share them with their network. (Note that businesses who use Rallio Activate for their employee advocacy program have built-in model release forms in cases like these where there would be a need to get permission to post.)

Employee Advocacy Works for All Types of Businesses

The businesses above are just a few examples of how employee advocacy could be used, even in unusual businesses. What type of business do you have? How do you think your team members could help spread the word? The Rallio Activate platform is designed specifically to help organize assets, activate employees to be brand ambassadors, expand brand reach and engagement, and reward and incentivize employees who contribute.

And it doesn’t matter if you sell everyday widgets or you’re participating in a Squirrel Census. Every type of business and industry can use employee advocacy. That’s because behind every business, there are real people doing real things, and that’s what makes a business interesting.

If you read through our case study of how one of our clients has made use of Rallio Activate for employee advocacy, you’ll see how effective and cost-efficient it can be. Schedule a no-obligation demo of Rallio Activate to learn more and see how it can benefit your business.

Rallio

Tags employee advocacy

Social

Case Study: How Rallio’s Employee Advocacy Platform Boosted Engagement for Pet Supplies Plus

Post author By Rallio
Post date January 29, 2021

Pet Supplies Plus (PSP) is a multi-location retail franchise organization with over 520 locations nationwide. As the preferred technology supplier for PSP, Rallio provides the social media SaaS and employee advocacy platform needed to manage, schedule, optimize and grow the chain’s entire social media presence — from corporate down to the location level.

While PSP has competitors in the pet retailer industry, the company’s unique selling proposition is their relationships in their local communities. Customers, and their animal companions, are considered “neighbors” and are treated as such anytime they walk through the doors of their local PSP. When you visit PSP, you can expect friendly service, helpful answers to questions, and plenty of love for any animal friends who accompany their humans on their visits.

With the rise in use of social media, particularly during the pandemic, PSP needed a way to generate more hyper-local images from team members in order to properly showcase individual locations on their social media pages. These images would provide the visual proof of PSP’s commitment to their local communities and their neighborly approach to providing the highest quality pet supplies and services. The assets would also further PSP’s reach on social media — with content shared by employees receiving up to eight times the engagement of content shared on brand channels.

Challenge

PSP had already been utilizing Rallio’s software and mobile app to automate their content scheduling, ad boosting, review responses and engagements on their local social media pages. Yet PSP stores needed to generate more hyper-local photos and employee advocacy posts from team members.

At the same time, PSP owners did not want to provide full Rallio admin login information to team members. Rather, they needed a way to allow team members to submit their own photos via limited logins — photos they were already snapping from their own phones and sharing via their own networks on social media. Furthermore, PSP needed to incentivize PSP team members to share content on their personal pages, thereby extending their reach on social media.

Solution

To address the challenges above, Rallio first developed limited logins enabling employees to submit photos. With a built-in model release form and easy-to-use functionality, the app simplifies and streamlines the process of taking in-store photos/videos, uploading them with comments, and submitting them.

The robust limited logins were rolled out to all PSP locations and team members in 2018. Then, Rallio launched a 30-day pilot program with six different PSP locations on Rallio Activate, a fully mobile employee advocacy platform that enables brands to engage employees as brand ambassadors. Using Rallio Activate, PSP would collect team members’ photos and videos in one central image library, allowing the brand to build a robust database of employee-generated content for use on local PSP pages. They were also able to activate team members to share brand-approved assets on their personal pages.

Along with the simplicity of uploading, Rallio Activate enables PSP to encourage more uploads by incentivizing team members — awarding them with $10 gift cards for uploading at least 10 images or sharing at least three pieces of content to their personal profiles. The entire process was automated through Rallio Activate, with no extra work required by PSP.

Results

Since the rollout of the limited mobile logins over two years ago, 3,395 PSP team members have been activated, equating to 173,513 images and videos submitted. Ultimately, these uploads have resulted in over 2,541,965 social media engagements (such as likes, comments, clicks and shares) from posts, which leveraged those assets that PSP otherwise would have not received.

With just these six locations alone, the pilot program proved to be successful in activating team members as ambassadors, incentivizing them with rewards, and generating more hyper-local assets. On average, the six Activate pilot locations experienced the following results:

41% increase in local posts created
320% increase in team member logins
816% increase in employee advocacy posts
23% increase in daily engagement

We estimate that if Rallio Activate were rolled out brandwide, PSP would have approximately 8,160 team member logins total, at an average of 16 team member logins per store.

Conclusion: Rallio is the Employee Advocacy Platform You Need

Brands that launch employee advocacy programs with Rallio Activate have an opportunity to expand their reach via their own employees, activated as brand ambassadors. With an employee advocacy platform and a formalized advocacy program, you can expose your brand to more people and extend your brand’s reach.

If you’re ready to launch an employee advocacy program, Rallio can get you up and running. It all begins with helping your employees understand the benefits of sharing content on their social media pages. Contact sales@rallio.com to schedule a no-obligation demo of our employee advocacy platform and get your program up and running in 10 days or less.

Convince & Convert says 83% of Americans are more likely to purchase a product or service that’s recommended by a friend or family member.

Rallio

Tags employee advocacy

Social

The 4 Types of Content Your Employees Should Post for You

Post author By Rallio
Post date January 26, 2021

Of course, before you get to the posting part, you’ll need to implement an employee advocacy program of your own. We recommend reading our article 5 Big Reasons You Need an Employee Advocacy Program for the hows and whys of advocacy.

As you develop your employee advocacy program, it will be helpful to give your employees some guidelines on the types of content you’d like for them to post. While you want employees to have some freedom to be creative with their posts, you also want to be sure you’re protecting sensitive information and presenting your brand in the best possible light.

Gather together with your employees to brainstorm different ideas, and come prepared to share with them the types of content they should be posting. The five categories below will get you rolling.

Branded Assets

The first obvious category is branded assets that you create and provide to your employees. They might be professionally created marketing graphics or videos, how-to tips about your products or services, contests, events or special promotions.

At the same time you’re creating these assets, consider creating a branded hashtag that employees can use when sharing on their personal pages. A dedicated hashtag about your brand helps to categorize your content and create conversations around your brand. You can also use the hashtag to locate employees’ content that you can then share on your company’s official accounts.

Learn more: How To Encourage Employee Advocacy On Social Media

A Day in the Life at Work

Although branded content has its place, it should not be the bulk of what’s shared via employee advocates. In fact, you’ll see that the remaining four categories do not mention corporate-branded content.

Events In and Out of the Office

Along with day-to-day photos, employees can also share photos and videos from special occasions or events both in and out of the office. Remind them to snap photos of birthdays at the office, team building events, and “national day” holidays (see calendar here) like National Hot Chocolate Day.

Again, you have opportunities to build culture as you’re building awareness. Host “bring your dog to work day” if you’re a pet-friendly company, or host a team lunch on the last Friday of the month. When you find ways to infuse fun into your company, your employees will naturally be more inclined to capture these moments on film and post them to social media.

The coolest part about these types of content — both candid moments and organized events — is that employees’ posts have a way of informing a company’s core values and culture. If employees are happy at work and posting about it, it’s a great indicator that you’re doing something right. If they’re not, and they don’t, it’s an opportunity to right the ship and make sure yours is a company that employees are proud to post about.

Answers to FAQ

Somewhere on your website, you might have a list of FAQ about your company. These FAQ can serve as ideas for the types of content your audience wants to see. Have an employee answer these FAQ, and the questions instantly become more interesting and engaging.

Any kind of company has certain FAQ that customers tend to ask. However, answers to FAQ work especially well for companies that have products or services that require explaining or step-by-step instructions.

If you have a furniture store that sells items requiring assembly, you can have employees be the experts and share their how-to instructions. Not only can your employees upload these videos to their own pages, but you can also use them on your corporate accounts.

Make sure you have clear answers to all your FAQ handy for employees so they’re giving “official” instructions. They’ll be more confident filming answers to FAQ if they have the correct tone and verbiage you want used for various situations. At the same time, encourage employees to use their own words and speak authentically to avoid sounding canned.

What Types of Content Should Your Employees Post?

Although each company is unique in the types of content they want employees to share, the common thread is authenticity. As long as your employees speak and write from the heart, and as long as they’re not sharing information you want kept private about your company, they should be successful as employee advocates.

A few final takeaways:

Create social media guidelines about what employees can and cannot post about
Have a social media policy that states when and how employees may use social media at work
Create a culture of advocacy by partnering with your employees and incentivizing them with rewards for promoting your brand
Use Rallio Activate technology to organize and streamline posting and collecting assets from employees that you otherwise wouldn’t have

The little moments at work are often the most meaningful for your employees. They spend a large part of their day working for you, and employee advocacy allows them to feel recognized, valued and heard.

Rallio

Tags social media marketing

Social

4 Types of Social Media Influencers to Power Up Your Brand

Post author By Rallio
Post date January 22, 2021

The concept behind social media influencers isn’t exactly new, as brands have long used influential figures to promote their products. Look back into the previous century, and you’ll see Coco Chanel as one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people, or even Santa back in the 1930s getting his caffeine fix with a bottle of Coca-Cola in his hand.

As far as modern-day social media influencers, Instagram as well as TikTok have been largely responsible for their rise in popularity. You can’t open these apps without seeing both familiar and not-so-familiar faces promoting brands’ products and services.

Influencer programs are a cost-effective way to spread brand awareness and increase your engagement, reach and followers on social media. In exchange for their promotional posts, these influencers may be given product, gift cards, affiliate commissions, direct compensation or other rewards, depending on how a company sets up its program.

With visual imagery, short videos and Reels, Stories and Live features, today’s social media apps allow multiple ways to help these social media influencers engage with their audiences. Keep in mind, your influencers can be people not affiliated with the company, or they could be employees who act as brand ambassadors. Rallio has specific technology (Rallio Activate) that helps you activate employees to post branded content on their personal pages, as well as build an image database to pull from.

If you’re wondering what type of influencer you need for your brand, check out the quick rundown below to find the right fit for your goals and budget.

Social Media Influencer 1: Nano

Follower count: 1K to 10K

Who they are: Nano influencers tend to have a highly engaged social media following, and they are vocal advocates for the brands and products they’re promoting. Given their smaller following, they have an opportunity to get to know their followers on a more personal level. Their authentic content and recommendations resonate with their small community, who appreciates nano influencers’ genuine tips and transparency.

Who should use them: Small and midsize businesses are a good fit for these social media influencers. Start with your own network of followers and even employees to identify possible nano influencers who would be willing to work with you.

Social Media Influencer 2: Micro

Follower count: 10K to 100K

Who they are: With 10K to 100K followers, micro influencers have a larger network but are still viewed as relatable, authentic and genuine with their audience, who enjoys engaging with and sharing their content. They tend to have a specialized audience base that’s open to hearing marketing messages about the products and services used by these micro influencers.

Who should use them: Micro influencers work well for specific niches and a highly targeted audience. If you’re looking to create special promotions and sponsorships with your influencers, a micro influencer can be a good fit. Their high engagement rates mean more eyeballs on your content and more opportunities to convert casual followers into loyal customers. To find them, you can again look to your own followers who are already fans of yours, as well as search for certain hashtags related to your brand or niche.

Social Media Influencer 3: Macro

Follower count: 100K to 1M

Who they are: Macro influencers have a much larger network, with anywhere from 100K to 1 million followers. They appeal to a broader audience than micro influencers and may be established bloggers, vloggers, podcasters or social media celebrities who have made a name for themselves. They may also be more disconnected from their audience and won’t have the same personal relationships with their community as someone with a smaller following.

Who should use them: You may have a harder time getting your foot in the door with a macro influencer, who likely gets pitched every day from brands asking for representation. If your brand is more well-established and you’re prepared to meet a potential influx of new orders, then a macro influencer could be right for you. In other words, if you successfully land a macro influencer and they agree to promote your brand, you need to be prepared to meet the demand from new customers.

Social Media Influencer 4: Mega

Follower count: 1M and up

Who they are: Like macro influencers, mega influencers also have a much larger network of 1 million followers or more. They’ve worked to establish their name — they’re either big-time celebs that are household names, or celebrities within a certain niche, like the fitness community. Again, they may be more disconnected from their audience than someone with a smaller following.

Who should use them: You’ll need to have a large budget and an established brand with locked-down distribution to work with a mega influencer. If you’re set on going with a mega influencer, and you’re looking to cast a wider net with your audience, a mega influencer can help you get in front of a lot of potential followers. For small brands just starting out, however, smaller may be better.

Which Type of Social Media Influencer Is Right for You?

For the majority of brands we work with at Rallio, we recommend working with influencers and employee advocates who have a smaller, focused following. Although it can be tempting to dive in and try to work with a macro or mega influencer, you might want to “think small” when you’re just getting started. There will be fewer barriers if you contact people who are eager to represent you and will have a greater influence within their networks right out of the gate.

Rallio Activate provides the perfect platform to create an employee advocacy and influencer program for your brand. We also have a new affiliate program with unlimited earning potential for those looking to earn one-time or recurring commissions off referrals. For more information about either of these options, click here to learn about Rallio Activate, and here to learn about our affiliate program.

Rallio

Tags social media marketing