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Social networking sites have become the latest media of communication. Irrespective of small and big organizations, one is able to make maximum benefit through social media. You might have wondered how certain things go really viral. Trust me, not everything can go viral. I can tell you that it’s like a dream come true for most of us when our campaigns or ideas in promoting a cause goes viral (like the grumpy cat) and get millions of viewers. It means getting a lot of business, as well.

The best thing is that there’s no one rule to have an effective campaign on social media. And you can definitely bend all existing rules (if any) and create new strategies for a successful campaign. You may also come across many instances where a casual campaign idea becomes viral without trying. So, here are some of the best practices you can include while gearing up a campaign on social media.

#1 Know What You Want Out Of Your Campaign

You need to know the purpose of your campaign or content. When you understand the purpose of your campaign, the rest falls into place. It could be creating awareness, promoting a social cause or brand, spreading the word about an important local event or even conducting a poll to know majority opinions on a topic.

Once you create the purpose, figure out your target audience. You could choose any strategy or even invent one, but ultimately it should point out to your target audience. This will help you in getting to the next step of designing your campaign.

#2 Design A Social Media Campaign

A thorough, well thought out plan is the thumb rule. For designing a social media campaign, there are three phases.

• Before you begin the campaign
  This is the planning phase. During this phase, you need to spend ample time in research and design of your campaign. Setting up time limits, understanding various ways to measure and track your campaign, choosing the platform and much more are things you need to focus on here. Understand the tools and search keywords. Get to the specifics of the campaign type you want to use. For example, decide if you want to promote your brand through existing content, driving more sales with coupons and offers, hashtag contests where you could ask participants to share your tweet or material by promising many giveaways and many more.
• During your campaign
  Monitoring is the most important aspect during the campaign. Using the right analytics tool will help understand how the campaign is performing. Check your traffic and leads on a daily basis. Active engagement with your audience is essential during this phase. The more people see you engaging with them, the more likely they participate and respond to you. Be nice to them and never try to indulge in any controversial topics. This is the time you could turn your audiences to your valuable customers.
• After your campaign
  Relax, it’s over! But you have the real work now. Thank your participants and customers and acknowledge their effort and support. This creates a positive impression. Compare your targets and analyze them with your goal settings. Know how and what went wrong, measuring both success and failure.

#3 Choose The Right Emotions

Emotions are what make people act on something. From New York Times analysis, posts that create awe, anger, joy, humor or anxiety create different responses and encourage people to participate. I remember how emotionally I was provoked on watching Vizen CNS CCTV campaign. Towards the end of the commercial you might realize it was a bit too much for the product. But the impact and viewers it created were solely due its emotional backup.

Similarly, blog posts, tweets with the right images and colors are more likely to go viral. Buzzsumo shows that people love to share contents with infographics, blogs and articles on ‘how to’ and ‘why’. Did you know campaigns have lucky days as well? Well, Mondays and Tuesdays supposedly get maximum shares.

#4 Introduce The Element Of Surprise

Everybody loves surprises! When your campaign has that element of surprise, people will definitely want to know more. Tell them something every day. Wait for their response and make your campaign more interesting by adding more elements with each passing day.

#5 Tune Your Campaign With The On-Going Events

When your campaign is based on a holiday or festive season, on any national holiday or an event which has lately gone viral, try to incorporate the season’s feel in to your campaign. By matching with the on-going event, people will connect to your campaign better. Having a content tied to an on-going event has better chances for a successful campaign.

#6 Provide Options To Share

When your campaign is doing great for any reason, provide options for people to share your content in all platforms. It’s a good practice to focus on all social media platforms and not just one. Remember to include all social media links. You never really know what works! Making your content shareable helps your followers do the business for you.

#7 Keep Influencers In Loop

Following top influencers is another way to bring your campaign to limelight. When your content is shared by top influencers, it creates a sense of trust and reliability among the people. Prepare a ‘top influencers list’ and proactively reach out to them on your content. Mention them on your posts, and then slowly, steadily build a good rapo with them.

Like I said earlier, there’s no one way for a successful campaign. What works for one may not benefit another. But you can definitely learn from the pros and cons of other campaigns. Keep measuring and tracking your campaign. You can decide to tweak your campaign design based on the tracking result. Above all, keep trying new ideas!

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