Engaging Your Audience With Wildly Successful, Targeted Messages

By: Lauren Albin, Administrative Assistant

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are all well known and frequently used. They’re important channels to utilize, but depending on the audience you are targeting, they might not always be the most effective. The first step to selecting a social media platform is to understand your audience on a deeper level and know exactly how they like to digest information. Some other factors to consider are the amount of time you have available to dedicate to social media and the availability of resources.

Here are a handful of alternative social media platforms that are on the rise in today’s media realm:

Vine: With six-second videos playing on repeat, Vine captures its users with emotional appeal ranging from humor, to talented voices and beautiful scenes. It is a mobile, video-sharing service built by Twitter.

Why use Vine:

• With a six-second max time, it attains the average human attention span of 8 seconds.
• It is closely linked and connected to Twitter, a major social media platform.
• Brands can create short how-to videos
• It targets both genders: 57 percent women and 43 percent men.

Quora: Created for those who like to contribute to conversations about various topics, Quora is a question and answer based website. Brands can share their expertise, expanding knowledge to others around the world.

Why use Quora:

• You can build your personal and professional brand by giving expertise in a given area.
• It can be used as a market research tool by looking up current topics and questions amongst users.
• A community of 9 million active users is reached.

Or, differentiate your brand by being the first to take over a new platform called Ello.

Ello: Starting as a private social network, Ello is intended to be exclusive to its users. Even though it’s a simple network, one has to be invited to be apart of Ello where users share stories, art and connect with people across the globe.

Why use Ello:

• There are currently 38,000 invites an hour, so it is growing rapidly.
• Ability to tell your brand’s story with a select, strategic audience.
• Attracts creative people: “We believe a social network can be a tool for empowerment. Not a tool to deceive, coerce, and manipulate – but a place to connect, create, and celebrate life.” –Ello