Our society reveres our youth. Global trends often take root with the up-and-coming generations before being adopted by the mainstream: think fashion trends, music, technology, social movements, TV shows, and the like.
When social media first found favour with late born millennials in the form of Facebook, it quickly dictated the premier cultural zeitgeist to come.
Of course, it didn’t take long to be pilloried by older generations with its time-wasting optics. Despite that, everyone and their grandparents ended up with a profile.
Today, we know better than stereotyping people and that of which we are unfamiliar with.
Or do we?
Industrial resource companies often shy away from adopting and integrating the latest image and short form video service platforms, Instagram and reels, Snapchat and TikTok, into their marketing plans.
One BIG reason: they just aren’t visual rich industries. Unlike the retail sectors of fashion and beauty or art and design. This means creating content will require more creativity.
But that shouldn’t put you off!
The phrase ‘thinking outside the box’ is the mantra for all creators, but certainly for the resources and investing spheres when, online.
The stereotypes of Instagram being only packed full of pouting influencers and that TikTok is just synchronised teen dance moves that COVID19 breathed life into, isn’t the truth. The truth is they are only a sliver of what can be found on these platforms.
There are some truisms when it comes to applying social media to your marketing plans.
It’s true that not every social media platform is right for every business.
There is no wisdom being on eight platforms simultaneously, but there is wisdom in analysing the cost benefit analysis of each platform. Combine that with an understanding of how it works (check out my handy PDF guide at the end of this article) and you can augment your businesses future exponentially.
Don’t stand in your own way
Insisting on preconceived notions about social media can mean closing the door on successful tools for your business and that’s short sighted.
Our collective technology advancements and ingenuity have moved our society quickly into a future world that not only exists online but is being talked about beyond our 3D reality with augmented and virtual reality and now the Metaverse.
Video is by far the most popular entertainment/information medium and TikTok is now the third most downloaded social media app tool, alongside Instagram reels, Facebook stories and Snapchat.
It's time to widen your audience and freshen up your biz’s place in the world online.
But first, what are the resources and investing communities using when it comes to social media?
Which platforms are resource industries currently using?
You will find the resource industry and investor relations mainly on LinkedIn.
The ‘corporate’ Facebook began in 2002 out of California, USA. Its objective was to be a networking, professional development, and employment hub. Today, it’s still faithful to this genre.
I would argue its more about recruitment than anything else as you can see this by the tools it has implemented over the years from up-skilling for premium members, profile indicators for the services you provide, whether you are a seeking a new position, what topics you post about etc.
Apart from competition from Twitter, LinkedIn has remained the sole dedicated business themed social media platform. Many professionals have noticed that during the Aussie COVID19 lock-downs it seemed to make bit of a comeback.
‘I don’t really use it, or I don’t know what I’m really using it for’. This is the answer I heard a lot when I asked a sample of Perth professionals what they thought about using LinkedIn for any purpose.
Still, we are logging in, so why do we use it?
It’s the sole one created for the purpose of business/employment/networking.
Professional services or white-collar workers make up most of the users.
Premium members have access to free online education programs.
Companies and recruiters use it to vet applicants and headhunt new employees.
Industry news and sharing personal career updates.
LinkedIn = a CRM database of who’s who and who knows who and is willing to show their affiliation.
However, I get the sense that while a lot of people say that its good for marketing, its only preaching to the converted. Which is great and easy. However, preaching to the converted silos your business off from others who could be part of your brands conversation and take it into new positive directions.
So, while its still helpful for business news, it’s not the best place to reach new audiences, spreading the word about your industry and informing people about your amazing business. That’s why Twitter snuck up on it and stole some of its thunder.
So, what about Twitter?
Twitter is a fast-moving app which facilitates the news of investments far better than LinkedIn, where changes can take up to two hours to appear. Twitter is in real time.
Twitter is powerful for influencing investments and investors and is more influential than LinkedIn.
Elon Musk has demonstrated this power (sometimes to his detriment) several times in recent years. Kylie Jenner bemoaned unfavourable changes that Snapchat had made to its app via Twitter, just by making two tweets, sending Snapchat’s stock price down, losing them a cool billion dollars the same day.
Apart from the celebrity influence on stocks, ASX businesses use Twitter to keep their investors and followers updated about business news easily. Using Twitter is (almost) fool proof and its only recently that they have updated and added new features to the platform.
Twitter allows businesses the autonomy to shape their image far more easily than LinkedIn can and does.
Still, Twitter is primarily a short message service of 280 characters or less. Short form video is still the world’s most wanted in terms of media today.
How much do you know about how social media works? Read on below and download my Understanding Social Media for Non Users An Overview guide and get to know social medias MO in no time!
Social media’s MO
No matter which platform you use as an individual or as a business, it’s all about what you put in to dictate what you get out of it.
It looks easy. Everybody can upload a photo or write a few sentences and hit post. But if you want to gain traction, there is a 3-part formula that when performed correctly, always works.
The 3C's of Social Media Content Creation
Strategy
Business and marketing plans
Everything circles back to your marketing and business plans. Both plans are as important as the other, but many dismiss the marketing arm as something that can be done on the fly or isn’t a serious consideration.
Today and in the future your businesses presence online isn’t just imperative, it’s going to be mandatory. As traditional media methods continue shrinking you won’t want to be left behind.
If you are in an industry that is not a visual business such as retail, fashion, beauty etc then you need to dig deeper.
Your future employees, business partners are all coming up and coming of age on these media platforms. You need to get on their level and discover what they find interesting, what drives and inspires them.
Recognising the opportunity
Attempting to use a platform particularly one that seems far and away from what you think is relevant to your business can be and is intimidating. Not something a lot of CEO's might want to admit!
Who are you talking to on TikTok?
Generation Z and a mixture of Millennials and Gen X
Gen Z born 1996 - 2010
As unlikely as it seems right now, these young adults mucking around online, will grow up and a good portion of them will be found in the future in these areas:
resources industry as your competitors
employees
entrepreneurs in adjacent industries
and/or know influential people that you want to get to know about your biz.
Who is Gen Z
Broadly speaking, Gen Z’s psychographics consist of strong emotions and preferences about the marketplace en masse. What they value encompasses the raison d’etre of why your business exists.
They want all the details before they give you their cash.
What do you do and how you do it.
Corporate responsibility activity.
How do you conduct your business? being transparent and not attempting to hide information will be to your benefit. Gen Z can sniff out a fraud like a bloodhound.
Your employees conduct, your businesses effect on the world it is in etc. They are very vocal about social issues and while it can be seen as a negative, if you find favour with them, they will shout your name from the rooftops.
Tiktok's latest stats on how it impacts the retail sector are impressive. While its not your industry, the stats speak for themselves in terms of how information about products and services is spread digitally today.
Ignoring them is doing your business a future disservice as there is a valuable target audience within them that you need to be talking to. This entire demographic is mostly unaware of things you and I would consider common knowledge from movies to music.
They are mostly only aware of businesses that they have seen online in some capacity.
If it’s not online, it doesn’t exist.
Investing content creation on TikTok
The only way to describe what is found on TikTok in the investing genre is abysmal. No-one has taken the time to figure it out right when talking about stocks. Wannabes abound with quick info that anyone with a Wi-Fi connection and a device can find out for themselves. It's generic and doesn’t help anybody. Or it focuses on wannabe crypto experts who were recipients of simple dumb luck and made gains but don’t know anything about how the actual market crypto or otherwise works.
On Instagram
See above.
What they also have in common is that they have no idea on how to reach the audience they are after. You can’t engage investors this way. What is on these platforms currently is a mish-mash of stock charts, crappy graphics (in this day and age!) and stock quotes with rap music overlaid as the soundtrack. The benchmark is low.
The resources and investing industry on TikTok
Check out Samso Social Outreach Package for the Mining and Investing Industry
The opportunity for snaffling this mile wide gap in these areas is ripe for the taking, just like the early bird gets the juicy worms first.
Without giving you the actual answers – consider these points.
What are the global trends of today? What are the micro trends? Consider all aspects of life. Make a list and see where your business can make inroads. Talk about how you got started. Part of strategic thinking is curiosity and passion. What brought you to where you are today?
Read the Understanding Social Media for Non Users An Overview guide and do the Do's list included in the guide and avoid the Don'ts. That way you will understand what agencies are talking about and you will have a new appreciation of the work they do.
Once you have figured out the trends that your business can use, try the following out either with your business internally or by working with an agency.
Marketing and digital content agencies that understand the resources and investor industries are far and few between. I would hazard a guess that Samso is the only one in Australia that can proffer this highly unique combination.
Samso can assist your business and showcase your story to an extended audience. It can help take your marketing strategy further and out of the box and be one of the first businesses in your industry to do so!
Telling your businesses story is at the core of what Samso is all about and delivering that information in the top mediums of today, video, and now the opportunity exists for Samso to take your company to the next level.
They can help you tell the world what you want them to know but in regular, bite-size formats on multiple platforms.
By taking a strategic, targeted slow burn approach, you will see how social media marketing can assist your business and extend your presence globally. Building a credible business reputation on the social media highway is imperative for your presence online.
Google Prefers Samso
Another perk of working with Samso is that your business will be seen by those searching the keywords associated with your industry, because Google loves the type of content that Samso creates. Even though there is more than one search engine online, Google is number 1. It's even earned a place in our pop culture vernacular with the phrase 'just Google it' as an information solution.
Google loves Samso's content both video and long form writing as Google's algorithm categorises long form written content to be over 700 words as more authoritative, authentic and accurate. This is in stark contrast to the plethora of short form videos and blog content found online that only delivers a basic, surface overview of a topic. As long as the content being created consists of quality material (and Google knows when poor SEO techniques are being employed, it's kind of like Santa in that way), it will reward the website with higher ranking results. So when your business features on the Samso website in long form content video or written content its a win-win.
You have heard about SEO, well now we have Video Search Engine Optimisation (VSEO). Video is the king of content in today's world. Visual methods of information trump every other format. Still, not everybody is on board with creating it themselves or even hiring experts like Samso to collaborate with and showcase their brand. Samso shares your important company information with a multitude of viewers who are in your target audience, which is priceless.
It’s their world and we just live in it
It’s a consumer’s world and showing them how your business fits in today’s social climate is one of the best things you can invest in now for the future benefit of your business.
Social media has overtaken the traditional forms of marketing with magazines going the way of the dodo, with only a handful of titles remaining and newsagents? What’s that? Yes, we still have the newspaper but even that is slowly being eschewed due to sustainability and the digital forms available online and the ability of Twitter to break the news in real time.
What it comes down to is that our old analogue lifestyle is disappearing, and a new digital world is overtaking.
Don’t get left behind. Take the leap of faith that you made when you chose to become an entrepreneur/investor and take that energy and run with it!
Open up our social media overview for non-users below to understand the fundamental features of introducing it into your marketing resources.
Samso Social Outreach Package for the Mining and Investing Industry
