With January being dubbed the Q5, is this a good time to increase budgets/scale in social media?
We think so and here’s why and how to get the most ROI possible:
- LinkedIn is seeing a slight increase of ~8% for bids because most eCommerce products are not actively promoted on the platform, and there wasn’t much holiday competition in bids. This doesn’t mean it’s not a good time to launch, if January is an historically great month for your brand.
- Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Pinterest are currently optimized for more spend and more efficient ROAS, due to lack of holiday competition. So, now is a good time to take advantage of these efficiencies and increase your share of voice. The average CPMS are 15% more efficient on Snapchat and the opportunity for growth and efficient ad spend is seen throughout these channels.
- With iOS changes, CPMs higher YoY, increasingly dwindling audience sizes/modeled data on platform, and less concern for supply shortages, now is a great time to start the year strong with spend increases and focus on driving demand in the coming months.
- Make sure your copy and messaging is seasonally relevant and speaks to the New Year period of January. This type of resolution messaging is effective for health/fitness and education brands.
- You should consider optimizing the remarketing campaigns, from the prospecting you fueled in Q4, especially if your brand isn’t focused solely on gifting opportunities.
- We recommend you work holistically with all social media channels to integrate the strategies and learnings from the previous year.
- You should use this time to do some housework to ensure your shops/feeds, integration and tracking are up to date to begin the new year with the right attribution.
- Mobile ad spends increased 23% in 2021 and are on track to hit $350B this year. You should continue to create campaigns/ad formats as the behaviors/mobile usage adopted at the height of the pandemic are here to stay.
- Consider adding emerging platforms like TikTok to your social media strategy, as it is currently seeing more visits than even Google, and has the potential to increase audience size/performance. That said, more users still convert on Facebook and Instagram so you should continue to create content/creative based on each platform’s capabilities/KPIS.
- Invest in video with lower bids as the ad is less expensive in January than it was in Q4 and is more likely to convert with shoppable videos/images. Video content also create better engagement/audience tests which are instrumental with the iOS changes in market.
Overall, you should continue to engage in ad format/audience and creative/mobile-first practices. But, keep in mind if you spend now, the efficiencies you start today could grow your funnel for the campaigns to come.
If you’d like to explore the best ways to manage your spend and scale in social media, contact us today. We’re here to help.
POV by Gellena Lukats, Director, Paid Social.
