The Power of Community: Advantages of Joining Up Paid Content and Social Media Strategies

Digital has forever changed the content industry. While organizations look to embrace paid digital content strategies, there is one key area which also needs considering.

Social media networks are growing and the number of users is thriving. So how can content owners tap into this pool of consumers by embracing a joined up approach to paid content and social media strategies?

How has Social Media Impacted Digital Content?

Social media has continued to grow in recent years and the number of users is increasing. What has also become apparent is that a growing number of consumers use social media primarily as a link to digital content, with news and content regularly appearing on their newsfeed.

Social media offers a level of insight that publishers and TV operators would often have to build up over a long period of time, such as a customer’s interests and hobbies, their favorite movies or books, etc.

With the number of social media users not likely to slow down soon, content owners can embrace the opportunities in social media to offer an improved customer experience and help increase customer loyalty.

How can Content Owners Unify Paid Content Strategies with Social Media?

Content owners can use the opportunities in social media and paid content to impact the business and offer an improved service for the customer.

User Perspective

Offering the customer the ability to share the digital content they read on social media and be rewarded for it is a key way to invoke customer loyalty and increase subscriber retention. If a customer willingly shares a piece of digital content across Facebook, Twitter or Google+, then to reward their action, you can grant them additional access, either to premium content or if they are a pay-as-go customer a number of free credits to additional content. There is also the opportunity to offer them free access to third-party products, this could be based on partnerships with these organizations such as a free access to Spotify Premium.

Content Owner Perspective

For the content owner, if a customer is sharing your digital content on social networks there is the increased chance of additional traffic on your site and therefore your content. This offers a great opportunity to collect new data on audiences outside of your customer base, traditional audience, and potentially your geographic target zone.

With the number of consumers coming through social referral, you also have the potential to receive social demographic information, which helps to build rich data profiles of your audience and identify the type of digital content attracting them. By acquiring more information outside of your subscription data, you can create more targeted content to reach those not yet signed up and increase the number of paying customers.

Integrating Social Sign-On

With social sign-on, content owners can use social networks to feed in additional data analytics. These can include, what the customer “liked”, who they follow and the content they interact with. This can be stored alongside the consumer record helping to build an advanced user profile, based on more in-depth information and behavior analytics, which can be used to better understand and engage with consumers in a more targeted manner.

The Benefits of a Sharewall

With advancements in monetization technology we are starting to see the adoption of sharewalls, which enable you to monitor whether a customer has shared an article across social media. This enables you to grant additional access and reward your customers for sharing digital content, completing a call to action on your site, or commenting and engaging with a piece of content.

You can reward your customers in a number of ways, and if you understand their habits and interests, you can tailor this to the individual:

• Additional access: offer access to additional content, such as premium content.
• Third-party discounts: provide discounts to third-party products or services.
• Credits: grant credits for performing certain actions, which can go towards a customer’s next monthly subscription or for additional products and services.

While offering these rewards, you can also present upsell opportunities, such as subscription promotions, for certain products or services.

Unifying Social Media & Digital Content Monetization Strategies

With deeper analytics into online consumers and digital subscribers, you can present a customized experience with the actionable data at your fingertips. Using this data, you can create a 360° customer view which can be used to create targeted products and services which you know will attract consumers and therefore increase traffic, conversion rates, and strengthen digital revenues.

Get in touch with our industry experts to find out how you can integrate social media alongside your digital monetization strategy.