Sayonara, 2022! Another year in the books for the Betsy Babes and our incredible clients. Before we get into our year in review, we wanted to share our biggest social media predictions for the year ahead.
There is no more running away from video.
No matter what happens to our beloved TikTok, video is here to stay - no doubt about it! If you’re not already taking advantage of video content through TikTok or IG reels, now is the time.
Consumers are looking for authentic and instant connections.
Consumers want to connect with the brands they love, which goes back to the significance of video content. They’re also looking for this connection in the DMs, so while it’s important to create engaging content, you must also have a solid community management strategy in place. Gone are the days when we could respond to messages in 3-5 business days. Consumers want immediate replies - that’s just the (virtual) reality of it.
User-generated content is serious business.
UGC is no longer simply sharing your fans’ posts to your stories. As customers become savvier about the digital marketplace, we’ll continue to see a massive increase in paid partnerships between brands and their consumers.
Just like the algorithms, trends in digital marketing and consumerism can shift at any time – and that’s exactly why you should take advantage now before you miss the opportunity!
*Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming!*
Now that 2022 has come to a close, we’re looking at some of the hard data to see how our year has shaped up within the world of social media metrics. We’ll look at some Betsy Bash numbers, but for us, the main focus is always on our clients and their results.
Audience Growth? Follower Count? Let’s see the numbers!
Social media is nothing without the people who use it, of course! So that’s where we’ll start off; how do our audiences look? How have they grown? For Betsy Bash, we have 9,105 followers across all our channels: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and TikTok. Growing your audience on social media is critical for expanding your business, but finding the right strategies to attract and maintain followers can be challenging. Ask yourself this: What type of content represents your business or brand that would also be interesting, engaging, and beneficial to your current and potential followers? Keep in mind that audience growth can come from both organic (posts on your feed or stories) and paid (paid ads) content; anything that gets your brand out there in front of your target audience.
In 2022, we helped our clients gain 31,281 new followers across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. We’ve continued to double the follower count for our client in the candle workshop industry, ending the year with 457 Facebook likes and 3,505 Instagram followers. When we started working with this client in 2020, they had only 94 Facebook followers and 766 Instagram followers!
Are the people engaging with us?
Having someone “like” your page is just the first step. Now, you need to develop content that invokes action (engagement) from your audience, whether that’s organic or paid. You want to encourage your followers to click the “like” button, comment, tag, or share with others. As internet-savvy millennials, we can spot a genuine connection between a business and its fans from a big brand that is trying too hard. Betsy Bash focuses on being relevant and remaining real and relatable for our client's content. This starts with creating strong, engaging content that resonates.
Engagement on social media is measured and quantified with three main statistics: Impressions, or how many times the content is seen; actual engagements, which means comments, reactions/likes, video views, shares, etc.; and the ever-important link clicks, the number of times people click on links to go to your website or page. Getting the most out of each of these statistics involves understanding your audience and what they want. We work with our clients to craft custom content that will get them the results they deserve.
Does your business need to get its brand out there, so people see you? We can do that! We had 128,112,805 impressions across our client’s Facebook pages in 2022. Do you want people to engage with your brand on social media? We can do that too! Over the last year, we’ve helped one of our clients increase their engagements on social media by 148%, with an average engagement rate of 2.6% over the industry average of 0.6%!
How’s the community doing?
So you’ve got followers, and they’re engaging with your content. Now, it’s time to talk to them! Not to brag, but community engagement is something the Betsy Bash team excels at. In 2022, we helped our clients respond to over 28,900 messages from their fans and customers. Each one of these messages was an opportunity for our clients to interact with their audience. While we can respond to every comment, DM, share, or retweet in your brand’s voice, we can also do outreach on your behalf. Community engagement outreach is spending time commenting on posts and content from people who may not be following you, but share common values and interests with your target demographic. By researching hashtags, Facebook groups, and more, we can look for new followers for you!
Community management is also wildly important for your Facebook groups. Since working with a top Maryland apparel company to grow its private Facebook community, we’ve taken their VIP group from having 75 active members per day to having over 600 active members per day! Responding to every message or comment can be a daunting task for any business, whether you’re a local brick-and-mortar store or a multinational product brand.
Another great aspect of active community engagement is discovering UGC (user-generated content) when your followers post about your product or service. Often your followers would love for you to share their content directly on your pages. When you place more attention on nurturing your audience, UGC increases. Our client in the cleaning product industry had 156 pieces of UGC in 2020. Betsy Bash helped to multiply this by nearly 8X in 2021, and continued to double the amount of UGC content to 2,205 in 2022! UGC is not only engaging but will help grow your audience.
They’ve got mail! But are they reading it?
Another service we offer for our brands is writing blog posts and newsletter-style emails. Every business can benefit from including blog posts on their website as they are an excellent source of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), in other words, a way for people to find your website and business by searching for a related topic!
Throughout 2022, we provided email newsletter services for a popular restaurant located in the saturated market of Houston, Texas. The industry average open rate for emails in this industry is 38%, but for our client, our curated emails maintained an average open rate of 49%!
What’s marketing without advertisement?
Advertising on social media platforms is the best way to attract those who may never find your page organically. Even if you are posting quality content, ads are still needed. Think of it like this: The content you share is your home; it reveals to your followers who and what your business is all about. But, if you don’t go out to that neighborhood bar you were invited to, how are you going to meet people to show them that home you’re so proud of? Ads are that neighborhood bar; it’s how your brand will meet all of its new friends!
One of the more obvious reasons for advertising on social media is to sell, and we’re pretty good at that too. Our advertising campaigns for a local candle studio helped to secure 317 new bookings and drove a whopping 20,000 individuals to their website throughout 2022. All those people were able to discover the experience of making custom candles thanks to the Betsy Bash team!
It was definitely a successful year for our clients, which means a successful year for Betsy Bash. We can’t wait to see what we can help out clients accomplish in 2023 and beyond!