VaynerMedia experts outline importance, targeting potential of social media

PHILADELPHIA — In 2014, VaynerMedia CEO Gary Vaynerchuk visited the Emerson Group to talk about how to market “in the year we live in.” But that’s no longer sufficient, so Vaynerchuk sent a team of VaynerMedia folks to give pointers to attendees of the 8th Annual Emerson Group Retail Industry Day on how to market “in the day we live in.”

“We’re living in a world where [mobile] is the first screen, not the second screen,” Mickey Cloud, VP VaynerMedia, said, adding that social has reached a scale and opportunity where if you want to increase household penetration by identifying consumers who are likely to switch to your product, you can successfully deliver a call to action with a high level of granularity.

“Take Facebook, for example. Facebook combines the scale of TV — where it has 1.3 billion monthly active users — with unprecedented accuracy,” he said. “You willingly joined that platform and you’ve given them information about who you are. … Then it also has learned about you based on your behavior on that platform. So this is a highly accurate depiction of who you are.”

And that pinpoint accuracy translates into fewer wasted ad dollars.

In a nutshell, reaching consumers through their mobile devices pinpoints a brand's target audiences, allows for message testing that drives relevance and conversion and further defines that consumer profile that in turn will make subsequent campaigns that much more impactful.

It’s a virtuous cycle.

“Social media is not TV, it’s not YouTube, it’s not a banner ad,” VaynerMedia account director Jesse Hutchison said. “What we’re seeing here is really a way to immerse ourselves within an audience and then use that as we build the audience. ... As video is moving more efficiently, we can then re-target [with] image content. It tells a deeper end of the story. It gives them the ability to click-through, go to e-commerce, do something else to further build that awareness, that purchase intent.”

“Facebook ads have evolved even further [than last year],” noted Vaynerchuk, who joined the presentation by way of Skype to help field questions, “and are driving even more meaningful business results.” And the kind of targeting granularity available through Facebook is reaching other social media platforms, such as Instagram, which is employing that kind of targeting logic in a beta test now, Vaynerchuk reported.

“The only thing I spend my time on is reverse engineering attention. Where is the attention of our consumer? Where is the best place to get to them?” Vaynerchuk asked. “Video matters more than ever. … Facebook is FSI 3.0.’”