Social Media

Social Media Audit: Stripe’s Company Blog

Stripe
| Danielle Geva

Company Overview

The following social media audit is based on Stripe’s company blog. Stripe offers an easy, and developer-friendly, way for companies of any size to accept web and mobile payments.

You can learn more about Stripe here:
https://stripe.com/
https://stripe.com/blog

Branding

Stripe has taken the time to create a clean blog design that complements their main site.* Individual elements, such as background colour and font style, shouldn’t be neglected as they can affect your visitors’ experience. Stripe achieves seamless branding by customizing their blog to convey the same professional and trustworthy image as their site.

Stripe

Incorporating the standard ‘stripe’ logo that appears on the main site, along with hand written ‘Blog’ text, is a nice touch for the title. Stripe also links each word to either the site or blog home page. Linking to your site from the blog’s header is a great way to drive traffic to your offering, as readers are more likely to convert.

Stripe

Stripe has neglected to add a bio on their blog, which may also serve as a way to increase conversion. A description of their services, or even a short tag line, can further educate visitors on Stripe’s offering and encourage them to visit the site for more information.

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Tips on Building Your Snapchat Audience

| Danielle Geva

Snapchat Brands

Some brands have started to experiment with Snapchat, but it seems many still don’t take the app too seriously. While Snapchat may seem silly, and has yet to offer business support, other innovative communication channels like Twitter were also discounted. Seven years later, Twitter IPO’d, so why not promote on an app that has already attracted 26 million users in the U.S. alone.

Demographics

Snapchat currently attracts a younger audience, as the majority of Snapchat’s users are between 18-29. If your brand targets a younger demographic, you might want to consider following your customers to Snapchat, as many are spending less time and slowly leaving other social networks. Businesses intending to reach tech-savvy early adopters should also consider promoting their product offering using the innovative platform. While these users may be less active on Snapchat, older early adopters are likely to have more disposable income.

Building an Audience

Having a presence on the network isn’t enough; the crucial part is building up your audience through a friend list. The best way to do so is by offering users an incentive to send you a friend request. You don’t necessarily need a large budget, instead think of creative campaigns that incorporate Snapchat’s unique features and capture users’ attention.

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Snapchat is Already Driving Ecommerce Sales

| Danielle Geva

Snapchat post

It used to be tricky proving the value of engaging customers online, let alone the fact that people were actually interested in talking about brands. Currently, there are useful tools which visualize brand chatter and prove that people are talking about ‘boring’ industries, such as banking and healthcare. Other advanced tools were also developed to aid in calculating ROI, in order to demonstrate that social media done right is good for the bottom line. However, support hasn’t been rolled out for recent social networks, namely Snapchat.

Snapchat itself has yet to offer built-in analytics or cater to brands. Since there are limited metrics available, only a small number of companies have chosen to experiment with the platform. Regardless, the absence from any social network isn’t stopping users from talking about your brand on that very platform.

Increased Word of Mouth

There is no doubt that social media buttons boost word of mouth and drive ecommerce sales. However, there are certain products that consumers would rather not share with their network. Consumers may opt to send a formal email or a text, but the time it takes likely deters many from spreading the word.

Snapchat’s design is optimal for sharing, as the app is quick to load and opens directly to the camera screen. Doodles and text can also be included for additional context. Product images can be sent to a decision maker, the user herself, or even be saved and accessed for later viewing.

Snapchat DKNY

Even though Snapchat can be as intimate as a text, especially with Android push notifications, the app has more of a casual feel. Since images disappear after viewing, the pressure is off and users are more inclined to share moments without thinking twice.

Ecommerce businesses benefit from increased word of mouth as one customer browsing their products can easily let others know about a new item or an upcoming sale. Even if the user isn’t sure their friends care about the deal, she knows they can stop viewing the image at any time. Further more, since the emphasis is on sharing rather than conversations, users don’t feel obligated to reply to every snap unless they are interested in more information.

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Introducing Social Media Audits

| Danielle Geva

Dare to Create Store

New clients often ask me for a sample of my work if they weren’t obtained through referrals. While this is a completely fair request, up until recently I couldn’t comply.

The startups I work with often insist on an NDA, and the small businesses simply ask that I keep the documents confidential. Seeing as my reports involve strategic planning, or are based on analytics that aren’t publicly available, it’s understandable that the client prefers to keep the information private.

Approximately a year ago, I was able to dig into the data of three clients in order to get some quantitative results to present to future clients. I’m proud of the results as they showcase some of my achievements, however, the document doesn’t go into much detail in terms of planning.

When preparing a social media plan, I like to combine my knowledge of best practices as well as examine successful accounts in the client’s space. Learning from the mistakes of well-established brands, and identifying effective activities, can help clients better understand key concepts which will in turn lead to improved performance.

Pinpointing specific strengths and weaknesses of a social media account, or overall online presence, can be thought of as a social media audit. Over the past few weeks, I’ve taken the time to create several social media audits, which are available for sale will be available as posts over the next few months. These documents are based on brands I admire, and are full of actionable advice.

If you’re interested in learning how to boost your Pinterest account, or what is the one thing missing from Square’s beautiful LinkedIn page, please subscribe and keep an eye out for future posts or contact me at for a custom report.

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Should a community manager’s primary function be content creation?

| Danielle Geva

Domestic Goddess

No, the community manager’s primary function is connecting users to each other and to the company itself.

The community manager is responsible for building, nurturing and growing the community. While content creation can be a part of the mix, it sometimes isn’t even part of the role.

Similar to parenthood, the more resources you have, the more specialized help can be obtained. In a small startup the community manager often takes care of outreach, customer support, content creation, email marketing, and event planning. However, larger teams may have one or more specialists assigned for each area, working along the community manager.

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