Online journey maps are the perfect vehicle when it comes to gathering feedback from your target audience. Whether you’re using them on your website or solely on social media, online journey maps are a great way to explore what your target audience knows, what they need to learn and most importantly how they react to your content.
Social media is just one big simulation in itself, and online journey maps are a perfect way to create a game within a game. Platforms like Twitter, Instagram & TikTok have algorithms built-in that cater to content content consumption. In this article, I’m going to discuss how you can use these algorithms in conjunction with online journey maps to create content that will help you grow a following and build a brand.
The beautiful thing about social media is that there’s always a sense of community present. From local businesses to connecting with other professional across related industries. So naturally, the next question is: How can you garner attention for your business through content creation , while also achieving your business objectives?
To add a touch of simplicity to social media, online journey maps are in place to help you identify what people are drawn to, what they like and how they engage around your content. But first, as always, you need to answer a number of questions that pertain to your business or brand, such as:
- How does your target audience consume content on social media?
- What’s their most actionable online behavior? Likes, comments, Retweets, etc. Where is the value?
- How can you best predict behavior? (How will your target audience react to your content?)
- How can you tie your business objectives into social media?
- What are they doing? Where are they located?
- Whats the platform of choice for your target audience? Instagram? Facebook? Twitter?
3 Ways To Use Online Journey Maps For Social Media
The sole purpose of using online journey maps on social media are to gather information on behavior and intent. You produce a piece of “valuable” content, now let’s see how people react. When using online journey maps for social media vs. your website, interactions lean more towards the dynamic side of your efforts.
As in, responding to content vs. responding to inquires about your service/product. Naturally, social media is a great vehicle when creating conversations and online journey maps can help you keep track of those conversations. No matter what social media platform you choose, the algorithms all come back to one result: take action.
The key is to be precise, intentional and value-focused. Let’s go over three ways you use online journey maps on social media.
1. ‘Search & Gather’ Content
‘Search & Gather’ content is for people who may or may not be collecting information for a certain purpose. This is why it’s ideal to have a number of online personas when it comes to your target audience. The more you know about who you’re talking to, the better the results. This will allow you to address overall wants and needs through content.
They could be researching a given topic, looking for a phone number/email or looking for a point of contact for networking. Creating these types of ‘content driven’ journey maps for social media are beneficial because you want to be at the top level when it comes helping people address a need or task.
SEO plays a major role in ‘Search & Gather’ content as well. We see this play out with the amount of free information that is being produced online. Even if a person, doesn’t decide to purchase your product or service. Being a source of reliable information is almost as effective as trading your time for a dollar amount.
This is why ‘Search & Gather’ content is considered the pinnacle of the Sales & Marketing funnel. Content is a great way to build brand value and lead ‘Search & Gatherers’ down a path to the next step, which is ‘Purpose Driven’ content.
2. ‘Purpose Driven’ Content
‘Purpose Driven’ content is for people who have already gathered information and are ready to act. This could be making a purchase, hiring someone for service or reaching out to your business on a personal level. All of this depends on what they may be trying to achieve at any given moment.
‘Purpose Driven’ content holds a lot of value given that it’s based on brand affinity. If your business is operating from a reputable position and a person has been engaging with your content, half the battle is already won. Now, it’s about follow through and positioning your content where it’s needed most.
A great example of this is Amazon, the online retailer places valuable content throughout the company’s Twitter feed, that’s both informative and entertaining. Their social media channel is a great example of taking a customer first approach, while also providing you with everything you need to know about ‘theoretical’ purchases (special occasions, delivery times, customer reviews, related products, etc.)
An effective approach to ‘Purpose Driven’ content is to experiment, gather data and study your target audience’s behavior. Which leads into the next step in the process ‘Interdependent’ journey maps.
3. ‘Interdependent’ Content
The key to any successful content marketing campaign is research. Take a look at the content that’s already successful. Take a look at your target audience (What are their overall interests?). Take a look at the social media platforms in question. What are the key actions & features surrounding the algorithm?
That’s the role content consumption plays in our target audience’s lives. Are they home? On the way to work? Lunch break? Evenings? Do they create content?
‘Interdependent’ content is a great way to tailor your content to the needs of your target audiences, while also adhering to the social media platform in question. Whether it’s Twitter, Instagram or LinkedIn. Every platform provides a unique opportunity to reach an end user. Producing an omnipresent value requires your content to be accessible across all platforms, channels and mediums.
The real play on human nature is knowing where to focus your energy to produce the most value.
Content creation for social media is a probability game. It’s a constant process of forming a connection and building a solid foundation around your target audience that speaks to not only who they are, but what they also are drawn to.
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