5 Steps for Food & Beverage Marketers to Succeed with Social Media

Social media is a place where content is king. Users scroll through their feed at high speeds. If you want your brand and message to make an impact, you have to stand out with thumb-stopping content. Based on our experience working with some great up and coming as well as established food and beverage companies, here’s what we found works to not only make an impact but more importantly drive sales. 

Step 1: Use Native Advertising

Ever since Twitter rolled out the promoted tweet, native advertising is everywhere on social media networks. Native advertising matches the form and function of the content within a network or channel. Because of this, marketers are using it with a high degree of success. The ads offer an opportunity for brands to make genuine connections with their target audience.

Step 2: Define Your Audience

It’s important to start with a deep understanding of the target audience if you’re going to use native advertising to make deep connections. Build an audience persona that details an ideal customer that goes beyond demographics. Document his/her values, lifestyle, motives, frustrations, etc. Understand how your food or beverage connects with these values and behaviors. This will guide your creative execution and ensure that it grabs their attention. 

Step 3: Use Best Practices

When making video for the newsfeed on Facebook or Instagram, add stylized captions where possible. Users likely don’t have the sound turned on. Vertical video works best in stories and the newsfeed. Use a 9:16 aspect ratio in stories and 4:5 in the feed to take full advantage of the space available on the user’s smartphone. Images need to look great and make use of filters, carousels, and collages. 

Step 4: Stand Out

Use beautiful, professionally shot video and images. These will easily stand out among the user generated posts. Use close-ups of faces while also making your food or beverage the hero. Showing people consuming the product, as long as it’s appealing, can be very effective for increasing favorability and purchase intent. For videos, don’t bury the lead. Use a reverse story arch by opening with the resolution or punchline and then working backwards. Make sure to introduce the brand early and often to increase brand awareness. 

Step 5: Connect

Focus on a single attribute or story that is highly relevant to your target persona based on their lifestyle, values, or frustrations. Remember people use social media as a leisure activity so make it entertaining or funny. Make your product the hero by showing how it solves a specific problem/issue that your audience faces. Users will interact with your native ads. Establish your brand’s voice and tone so you can engage when appropriate. This is a great opportunity to build favorability as users will appreciate your attention to their interactions.

Conclusion

When using social media marketing to promote your food or beverage, consider your target audience when developing creative. Make sure your content is relevant to your defined audience persona. Also, have fun! Afterall, it’s social media. 

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