[July 03, 2023]
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We could begin this blog with some cliché attention grabber – as that’s what this blog is about. But we’re above that. Instead, we’re going to get right into the meat. It’s not easy to get the audience’s attention. We may not have all the answers, but it is a great place to start your attention-grabbing journey.
Establishing a connection with your target audience should be priority number one (and priority number two). As Inc. explains, many successful companies make the conscious decision to prioritize their customers and their experiences. In today’s large, connected world, every customer-facing department should focus on building better customer outcomes and relationships. Disconnected sales and customer success divisions can leave buyers feeling baited and switched, or unhappy with their experience.
Champion customer success. Establishing and maintaining deeper connections with customers can better drive growth and increase revenue. As a business, you’re competing with tens, hundreds or even thousands of others just like you. They all have some form of marketing, a social media presence and an established brand, so getting to them first by effectively grabbing their attention can be a matter of life or death for your company.
Attention Grabbing… with Brand!
Your brand helps distinguish you in the marketplace. It also extends far beyond just a logo and colors. A good brand communicates a clear story about the company. Having a clear story can, and should, elicit an emotion. Making that human connection helps move sales and generate return on investment.
We’ve explained at length how to approach your brand. A brand should have an identity (who it is), personality (how it behaves) and experience (how it’s remembered).
Be clear with your branding. When people can immediately tell what your value proposition is, it will not only grab their attention, but hold their attention longer. Your messaging should also be clear, concise, and written specifically for your target audience. Did we mention clarity?
Oh yeah, don’t forget your audience. Avada explains that designing a brand that’s too general is a commonly made mistake. You need to identify your specific market niche that you’re going to sell to, then identify your group of target customers with shared interests and needs.
Attention Grabbing… with Media!
Social platforms have evolved over the years to keep the user’s focus on images, video and animated graphics. With so much visual stimulation online and on social media today, brands are vying to outdo one another for consumers’ attention.
Keeping media clean is a great way to get and keep audience attention. Brains take in a huge amount of data with a single social media scroll. There isn’t time for your content to have high cognitive demand because there’s just too much happening in your ad creative. Sometimes less truly is more.
Utilizing a mix of integrated media and interactive media is likely the best approach, but like everything, it should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Integrated media is a combination of media formats and channels that businesses use to share content with audiences. This can be a combination of traditional (like print and billboards) media, digital media, broadcast media, or product packaging. Integrated media, or a multichannel and multimedia approach to marketing, will help grab and keep your audience's attention.
Using integrated media essentially ensures that all audience segments will encounter its posts and ads, and likely on various channels. Different types of media on different platforms will help you figure out what your audience likes and dislikes.
Your overall marketing strategy should also include interactive media as well. Interactive media utilizes engaging visuals or videos that encourage audience interaction and participation. This form of media captures your audience's attention, delights them, and creatively presents your product or service. It also provides them with an opportunity to feel connected to the brand, and that gives you staying power.
Attention Grabbing with… Social Media!
The best way to grab your audience’s attention with social media is to be authentic and approachable. Social media should be an extension of your brand — a way to amplify your brand’s voice. Every marketer dreams of going viral, but it’s important to make sure your content speaks to who you are, not just what’s trending at the moment. We can’t all be Wendy’s.
There isn’t one concrete answer to best social media practices. We’ve offered a few tips on how to get results with organic social media, but we recommend trying a few different tactics.
While working with an influencer can help boost your brand, User Generated Content (UGC) can be just as effective at spreading your message. Utilizing current happy customers who are sharing pictures featuring your products or services is a great way to spread your message and maintain your authenticity.
When it comes to tone, Forbes recommends it be fun, useful or inspiring. Viral ideas are hard to come by. Mix it up between an image, a story, a video, etc. (back to that integrated marketing we mentioned earlier) and see what works best for conveying your message. Varying your social media posts can appeal to a wider audience with different likes and wants from a company.
Speaking of video: Short and concise video content is a great way to grab your audience’s attention. Adding captions to quick, easily digestible videos can increase engagement and leave a lasting impression on your audience.
Finally, be platform specific. A great way to grab your audience's attention is for tailored content to show up natively in your audience's feed, when and where they expect it. For example, if your video shows up as recommended on YouTube and it's clearly in sync with what they were expecting, then they'll probably keep watching.
In that same vein, when brands repost content from Instagram on Twitter, instead of making a separate Twitter post, people are less likely to click on the link than if they were to see the post right on Twitter.
You Grabbed Their Attention … Now What?
You’re going full-speed ahead now, and that’s great. But, make sure to stay grounded. You (probably) aren’t Coca-Cola or Apple (and if you are, what are you doing here? Hit us up!). You (probably) don’t need a million-dollar commercial at the Super Bowl. Connect with your audience, grow your customer base and stay consistent. It’ll pay off in the long run.
Lastly, provide clear (there is that word again!) direction. You’ve posted that video or shared that blog. Now what? Include a call to action, or CTA. Clear CTAs give your audience a task. Learn more. Follow us. Click here. Simple, but effective. If you’ve done your job in marketing, someone will want to learn more or buy something from you. Show them exactly where to go!
Questions? Contact us today! We have branding, media and social media experts ready to help you achieve your goals. (See what we did there? A clear CTA).