No matter your view on Trump, marketers from all across the political spectrum have to admit that President Trump is a master of social media. You might laugh and poke fun at his all-caps tweets and late-night typos, but throughout the last four years of his presidency, he managed to use social media to his advantage like no other president before. Even if you don’t want to get a seat in the White House, that doesn’t mean there aren’t a few strong lessons for effective social media marketing to learn from the outgoing POTUS.
One Message, Many People
When most marketers think of getting a message to travel far and wide on social media, they might think viral marketing is the way to go, where one message is disseminated by a few high-profile influencers in order for it to gain traction. Trump has shown us that the opposite can also work and this is known as big-seed marketing.
Big-seed marketing is when you take one message and try to ‘seed’ it in as many different places as possible, across different platforms and media. You want to get your message in front of as many eyes as you can. Trump did this by manipulating mainstream media into reporting on his own tweets. His words were then communicated far beyond the millions of his own Twitter followers and onto the TV screens, newspaper front pages, and social media accounts of the wider public.
Make the most of as many contact points with your audience as possible; the more they see your content, the greater impact it will have.
Attention-Grabbing Content
The reason why Trump was able to get so many people talking about his tweets was that they were shocking. Although you should keep your content relevant and in line with your brand, having content and posts that grab people’s attention will make them remember not just that post, but your brand as a whole.
Think of using juicy questions, colourful graphics and engaging topics of the day to catch the attention of your audience. You want to stop people mid-scroll, hold their attention, and invite them to learn more about your business and what you do.
Authentic Personalities
It may not be to everybody’s taste, but Trump’s personality certainly comes through in his tweets. He shares his opinions widely and often, not hesitating to offer his two cents on the daily news.
Every modern brand has a Twitter account, a Facebook page and an Instagram feed. People have grown used to the same generic messaging from brands; you need to inject a level of personality into your content. Share the real you where appropriate and let your audience know that there is a human behind the handle.
Know Your Audience
Throughout his presidential campaign and his presidency, Trump knew what issues were important to his key demographic and what they wanted to hear from him. He knew what to say to garner praise and support and played upon those issues with emotive, powerful language. You need to know your audience to the same level.
You should use this information to inform every aspect of your social media strategy. What will appeal to your audience? What will catch their attention? What will encourage them to go from passive viewer to engaged customer? Answering these questions is the first step to creating truly effective social media content.
Take Risks
There was no way of knowing for sure in 2016 that Donald Trump’s eclectic social media presence would pay off. Indeed, many politicians and marketers alike dismissed his Twitter threads as nothing more than mad ramblings. And yet here we stand, four years later, at the end of his presidency.
Trump took a risk with his social media and it paid off. Be prepared to take the same risks with your own feeds. Get creative with fresh ideas, jump on new social media trends and embrace emerging platforms. It can be scary to take risks but when they pay off, you win big.