Arizona Innovation Marketing Association Event Recap

A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of attending my first-ever AZIMA (Arizona Innovation Marketing Association) event. While a little out of my public relations wheelhouse, the event’s focus was on understanding how to effectively engage your client’s audience. Needless to say, this is a topic that crosses over between both the PR and marketing fields.
The event was called “Get Engaged! (No Ring Required)” which was catchy enough as is—some would even go as far to say engaging! The featured presenter was Nani Saffer, vice president of account management at NetBase Inc. She talked about how engagement is the strongest indicator of what’s working and what’s not for your client’s brand.

Here are some of the takeaways from AZIMA’s Get Engaged! Event:

Build a relationship with your audience.

Respond to comments and messages from your followers, which is such a simple thing to do! You want them to care about you so you have to care about them. As result, it will be easier for you to analyze sentiment and create posts based on consumer interests all while talking about your brand.
After you make friends with your consumers, it’s all about maintaining those friendships. No matter how big or how small, you must be attuned to the fluctuations of your channel’s sentiment. This will help you to anticipate your audience’s needs before they need to ask.

What is social sentiment and why does it matter?

Nani explained that social sentiment can be measured by two key values: Net sentiment, which lets you know whether the perception of your brand is positive or negative, and passion intensity, the strength of those positive or negative feelings on social media.
Many brands have begun to start monitoring sentiment to understand consumers’ perception of their own brand, their competitors and their industry. Once they see their sentiment performs, brands can use it as an indicator of campaign effectiveness.

Track trends in real-time.

In order to keep your audience engaged, offer something fresh while also keeping in mind what they care most about. By tracking trends in real-time, you can capitalize on opportunities when they present themselves. For example, Oreo and Arby’s were both quick to use trends to their advantage when the lights went out during the Super Bowl and when Pharell made and interesting fashion choice.
The main takeaway is to simply give your audience what it wants. Advanced social engagement doesn’t necessarily require extra skills or information, but rather knowing what to do with the information that you already have.