All digital marketers worth their salt are well aware that content is important to any effective digital strategy today, but making that content emotionally engaging and shareable for your target audience was one of the main topics discussed at Social Media Week in New York 2014. We've put together some takeaways from key panels including insight from industry leaders such as Buzzfeed, Upworthy and a number of international entertainment brands.

1. How to use social media for your brand
Social Media Week – New York takeaways
February 2014

2. Executive Summary
All digital marketers worth their salt are well aware that
content is important to any effective digital strategy
today, but making that content emotionally engaging
and shareable for your target audience, whether you’re
a big brand or a small business, was one of the main
topics discussed by almost all of the some 200 panels
and keynotes that made up Social Media Week in New
York this year.
Screenburn was thrilled to attend the conference as part of ‘Digital Mission 2014’, organised by digital
marketer community Chinwag and UK Trade & Investment (UKTI). As well as having the opportunity
to meet some of the top marketers at companies such as Bloomberg and BBDO at specially arranged
events, the Screenburn team attended the main conference where some of social media’s leading
brands and platforms were in attendance to discuss current industry trends and what’s next in this
incredibly fast moving world.

3. The Content Marketing Revolution
Creating engaging, shareable content was one of the major themes at social media
week. James Gross, co-founder of digital agency Percolate, gave a great overview
on how social and mobile has changed the way we all think about content marketing.
The talk set the tone for a morning of discussion put together by Percolate.
James took a look at what he called “the web phase” of digital, when marketers
focused on banners and microsites that were driven by planned and very structured
campaigns.
This was a time when LinkedIn was really just about resumes and CVs, Google was
‘just’ a search engine and Facebook was thought by some to be overvalued at $11
billion.
Although this seemed huge at the time, with many thinking it would be the “next
MySpace”, it’s now valued at $163 billion. Something significant has clearly
happened in the meantime.
James noted that the rise in mobile has created “sustained communication” where
“we never go dark”. Mobile has almost “simplified marketing”. Most people are now
just on two platforms, iOS and Android – Flash and banners have been removed
from the equation as irrelevant and the pace of media has increased. In many ways,
campaigns are now constantly ongoing. “You pull the screen [to refresh] to find
context.”
This thirst for content and context at a relentless rate has helped to fuel social as a
key driver of the online conversation.
Significantly, many signs show that page rank can be effected by a brand’s
performance on social. James surmised that social was an important factor in the
evolving face of digital marketing, but mobile “was the catalyst”.
What’s most mind-boggling is that only around 40% of people around the world are
connected to the internet. It’s incredible to think what will happen when the other
60% are connected too.
Percolate’s James Gross

4. Navigating Internet Subcultures
Everyone from big brands to unsigned artists are looking for where their audience is
online. Hosted by Kelly Anne Meyers and Saeid Edward from agency Code and
Theory, this talk focused on some of the unwritten rules that apply to internet
subcultures where the most passionate conversations are taking place between fans.
Tapping into subcultures online enables brands to create more meaningful
connections with consumers, but it’s important to develop a strong identity that talks
to people. “Brands can’t speak like robots anymore”, noted Kelly, brands need to be
“more like the baker down the street.” Relationships should therefore be cultivated to
encourage loyalty.
Kelly showed some examples with makeup brand Maybelline and how it’s leveraged
platforms such as Tumblr and We Heart It to talk to the teen demographic.
In effect, these platforms can serve a huge focus groups. Marketers can use data
build behaviour insights such as looking at the ‘mood words’ people are using and
see what times people are talking about the brand.
Looking at data such as this, it’s possible to identify sub cultures online. Looking at
an online fast food campaign for example, you can begin to see the differences in
demographic between a ‘healthy group’, a junk food group’ and a ‘lifestyle’ group,
which identifies through the brand. Thinking about these different audiences
therefore becomes important.
To talk to these groups more directly, brands need to get away from the corporate
voice and become a “digital artisan”, referring to the earlier ‘baker down the street’
analogy.
Therefore it’s important to understand the unwritten rules of these subcultures, which
are in place to preserve the purity of the conversation for people. Some sub-Reddits
for example literally have posting guidelines on the sort of content people should
include and the format they should post a joke or some music, for example.
Saeid noted that understanding these “due diligence” guidelines is important before
brands “go in” and rule one is that it is vital to be authentic and respect the
community – don’t go in and pretend to not be an advertiser if that’s ultimately why
you’re on the platform.
Kelly Anne Meyers and Saeid Edward from Code and Theory
Added value is an effective way to engage with an online sub-culture, such as
providing a tool that resolves a consumer’s everyday problem.
For example, Kelly showed how makeup brand Essie replicated the colour wall seen
in-store on their website to improve user experience instead of using the usual drop
down menu you might see on a website.
As a result, content on-site has an average of 70 organic pins through Pinterest. “[It’s
about] understanding where your consumers are and what they’re passionate about.”

5. Keynote from Jonah Paretti, founder and
CEO of Buzzfeed
Buzzfeed’s Jonah Paretti gave a fascinating insight into how the platform had
evolved to become the mammoth success that it is online.
As a grad student in MIT, Jonah has ordered some custom Nike sneakers with
‘sweatshop’ emblazoned on the side. This triggered a chain reaction of emails with
Nike, who considered this ‘inappropriate slang’. Jonah forwarded this to friends and
interest quickly picked up. Putting things firmly into context; “Social in 2001 was an
email forward” said Jonah.
Perhaps ironically, Jonah felt that reaching too many people can actually hurt your
brand, like when a page is over-optimised for SEO and doesn’t answer someone’s
search query. Therefore quality, and something people can identify with, is better
than quantity.
The Buzzfeed team is learning as it goes on what works. Although quizzes have
become a pretty big deal recently, Jonah revealed the team has been working on
quizzes for six years and that “there have been a lot of failures along the way…the
actual default is failure”
Taking this lesson, the team has learned that “most content often doesn’t work”
however the great thing about social is “your best work is seen by the most people”.
He added the team had been keen to “maximise learning and not maximise traffic.”
It’s this more analytical approach that has clearly led to the passionate following for
Buzzfeed online. After you find something that works, “it’s natural to do something
derivative version of that” But it’s important to re-think and improve on each iteration.
“Even the way we do lists now is different”.
Even the structure of each team has been to play to the strengths of the particular
content they’re focusing on. The structure depends on the editor, who leads the
team. Some teams don’t even focus on data in the same way that one might think.
“Political reporters focus on scoops – you can’t optimise for a scoop”. Instead of
looking at data, the team closely monitors online conversations which can help to
decide on how to present the story. “Traffic is a by-product of a good scoop”.
Jonah Paretti, founder and CEO of Buzzfeed
In contrast, entertainment, or the ‘Buzz team’ looks at a lot of data. It’s still best to
rely on “confident, smart people” who won’t be blindly led by the data though. For
example, if the headline could be perceived to be deceptive. It’s always best to ask
“If I was a reader, would I be happy with this headline?”
Buzzfeed is maturing. When it began, there was a perception was it was ‘full of cute
kittens’, but as people have become more engaged, Buzzfeed has been able to
move up the market. The site is now looking to put together a team of Pulitzer Prize
winning authors for long-form investigative pieces.
Facebook’s algorithm changes is always a big topic for content creators and brands.
We don’t want to optimise for Facebook, but optimise for people” explained Jonah
“We don’t play up to the Facebook algorithm quirks.”
Looking to the future, it’s clear that video is going to play a big role a Buzzfeed,
although he noted that entertainment content tends to work better for video online
over ‘hard news’. Buzzfeed is looking to do with video what it has done with articles
and a team in LA is already making a “television studio for the mobile age, something
consumers will love”.

6. Fuelling Social Fandom at MTV, VH1 and
Comedy Central
Social media heads from MTV, VH1 and Comedy Central took to the stage to
discuss how social was being leveraged to increase fan engagement.
There’s no roadmap to building an online fan base, so the discussion centred on
some individual experiences.
Tom Fishman from MTV noted that “fandom is word being used a lot, it's not the
same thing as fans. Fandom is higher level of passion”, citing some of the online
communities surrounding shows such as Teen Wolf and Sherlock.
The panel agreed that social was about the long-term relationship with fans. Comedy
Central’s Dan Steele said they look to “surprise and delight people”. He noted that
his team listened to fans but also put out pieces of a puzzle and let them express
themselves.
Similarly, it’s useful to look at what works on particular platforms and then provide
more of this.
The panel discussed when was best to engage with online communities in the first
instance. Tom Chirico from VH1 said they had noted fans wanted to learn how to do
TLC’s iconic ‘creep’ dance, so the team did a Vine creep tutorial. He said they ask
“what are people doing out there anyways and how do we take it step further. That's
when we jump in.”
Tom Fishman noted it’s important to treat the people who jump in first as special in
the fandom community. For example, a girl started rapping recaps of episodes for
teen wolf and now works as content creator for MTV.
Discussions turned to the role of talent in social media. Don Steele noted that
comedians love social media, “Dane Cook used MySpace back in the day to win a
day of programming.”
“Talent is everything” noted VH1’s Tom Chirico. Having a conversation between
talent and fans can mean is important and people want to feel part of shows and
have their voice heard, but that is was also important to advise talent when not to
engage in a Twitter war.
Don Steele from Comedy Central, Tom Chirico from VH1, moderator Natan Edelsburg and
Tom Fishman from MTV

7. “For people who still care” – Upworthy’s
founder on the secrets to success
Upworthy was started for “people who haven’t completely given up on the world”
according to founder and CEO Eli Pariser.
Speaking to a huge audience at Social Media Week in New York, Eli took a look
back at the history of the still remarkably young content aggregator. “The most
important social topics aren’t doing that well which is strange as we live in the
information age but it isn’t reaching the broad audience.”
He noted that important topics aren’t shared because they’re often packaged up in
dry ways. “People publish it as an ‘information vegetable’ – you have to consume it
but it doesn’t have to look tasty”. Whereas pre-internet, a reader would have to scan
important topics when flipping through a newspaper to get to the more niche section
they were interested in, hard news now has to “swim in the same pool as Kim
Kardashian.”
The team set themselves a rule from the beginning. “We would never post anything
that we didn’t think spoke on a wider issue….Instead of doing dry stuff, we’ll try to
make it emotional.”
Significantly, this goes against some of the fundamental ‘rules’ of online content,
whereby the team wouldn’t focus on what was trending but on what was interesting.
This also meant that quality is a lot more important than quality to Buzzfeed. In
December 2013, Yahoo published 130,000 articles in a month. Upworthy published
246. “Instead of hustling to get stuff on the web, we tell curators to publish something
they really like.”
Eli addressed this issue of Upworthy headlines, which some have criticised as being
little more than click bait. “There’s no question that we love good headlines. They
drop someone into a piece of content but don’t make it go viral.” If a headline is good
but the content is weak, there’s a strong initial spike but any chance of sharing peters
out. “The lesson is if you want to get large numbers of people to tune in you have to
get them something they’re excited to get out with their friends.”
Touching on the dangers of misinterpreting data, Eli noted it was important not to
draw broad conclusions, such as no one begin interested in a serious topic like
foreign affairs just because no one read your article on Afghanisan. “The key thing to
Upworthy’s Eli Pariser
remember here is the result of 50 years of psychological study – people have a
struggle between the self.” People aspire to be well-read but fight with the other part
of themselves that just wants candy now, or content that perhaps isn’t quite so highbrow.
“The key has been to bring together aspirational and behavioural signals.
Behavioural is what people do and the other is what they say they want.”
The team works to collect both signals and treats both selves equally. “You have to
feed both.”
Eli feels vindicated through Upworthy’s success. Looking back at 2013, it’s clear that
people have engaged with important topics. “People really do care about the
important stuff…people have looked at class and equality issues.” Unworthy has
achieved this with “No celb stories or quizzes on which Downton Abby star you are.”

8. Buzzfeed on how content is king, but
distribution is queen
Digital marketers these days are well aware that ‘content is king’ but, says
Buzzfeed’s Jonathan Perelman, “distribution is queen, she wears the pants.”
The joint interview, which also included Mohan Renganathan, Group Director at
Starcom MediaVest Group, looked to identify how brands could better leverage
social by being both practical and emotional.
Jonathan noted that GE’s tumbr resonates with consumers in a way that’s
advantageous to the brand. They might sell jet engines, but the brand looks to share
meaningful and fun scientific insights with their online audience.
“Ultimately it’s about value business results” said Mohan; “what value it’s driving to
the brand”. He explained that it can be useful to look at online conversations to see
what consumers are interested in, but it’s also sometimes best when “rolling up your
sleeves…and getting a brand involved in a content story”. He noted that it is always
important to “tell the story that’s authentic” – and not just to slap a logo before a
commercial break.
Jonathan agreed that authenticity was fundamental to success. “Everything from
breaking political news and breaking animal memes. It’s all supposed to be shared”,
with social media as the basis. “We create content for someone to engage with – for
it to speak to them. Hoping that they will share it…Hopefully this will speak to their
circles.”
Jonathan said he had a moment of realisation when an undergrad student told him
they didn’t buy traditional newspapers anymore, but instead told him ‘If the news is
important enough it will find me.’ “Undergrads today are born with the internet”
Jonathan explained, “if something is important enough they are on these platforms
and they will hear about it.”
He noted that the Buzzfeed team was always going to experiment and see what
works best for distribution, with the team beginning to look seriously at video content
too. When addressing Buzzfeed’s penchant for ‘lists’ as a way to engage a casual
audience, Jonathan responded with a smile. “First of all, lists work. The Ten
Commandments were a list…search results are in list form…I think it’s going to
continue. But there is obviously an evolution to that.”
Jonathan Perelman (left) and Mohan Renganathan (right) interview each other at Social
Media Week

9. What the academics say – Unruly expose
the science of sharing
Unruly’s co-founder Sarah Wood gave a particularly scholarly twist to proceedings,
revealing some of the research findings from academics who are “working to crack
the code on social video sharing.”
The social marketing company works with many academics who have gone on to
publish work on the phenomena, such as Karen Nelson-Field whose book ‘Viral
Marketing: The Science of Sharing’ had shed some light on these insights.
For example, videos that elicit a strong emotional response are twice as likely to be
shared. Sarah cited the Dove ‘Real Beauty’ ad, which spoke to anyone who had ever
felt unhappy about their body. The ad has received 4.2 million shares and 124 million
views.
She did note that although positive videos are more likely to be shared, it was
important for marketers to “think beyond babies and cats”, as although it can feel like
the internet is “made out of cats”, there are equally many cat and baby videos that
are not readily shared. “What matters is the emotional connection…stories of
personal triumph…they do impact sharing”.
Although it’s tempting to let your imagination run away with you – you should always
“be true to your brand”. There’s a social sweet spot between shareable content,
relevance to the audience, and how integral it is to the brand.
Many marketers can feel uneasy about putting the brand front and centre in a
carefully constructed social content marketing campaign, but Sarah noted that
“There is no correlation between shareability and level of brand. You don’t need to
be shy about the brand.” Instead, you can even make sure the brand is essential to
the plot. “Think of it as a movie and your brand is the protagonist.”
Similarly, there is no correlation between video length and success on social media.
“If you have a compelling narrative, you can take the time to tell the story.”
As a final takeaway, Sarah also felt that a paid element was fundamentally important
to a good social media campaign. “Don’t over invest in content and under invest in
distribution…a video seen by few cannot be shared by many.”
Sarah Wood, co-founder of Unruly

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