Does posting memes assist to extend site visitors to your web site?
It is a key query, which actually pertains to every kind of partaking social media posts – as a result of whereas a lot of these trending updates very clearly garner Likes and feedback, do they really profit the stats that actually matter to your small business?
I imply, Likes and followers are nice, however what you want is conversions, relative to what which means for your small business. For SMT, we’re working to get as many individuals to learn our posts as doable, and as you’ve doubtless observed, we’ve lately been making an attempt out memes as a method to enhance engagement, and see what that will get us on this respect.
So what have we discovered? Right here’s a fast overview of the preliminary outcomes of our meme experiment.
First, a fast little bit of background…
We’re all the time seeking to attempt new issues, and take a look at out the newest traits and processes, and never simply because it would assist us generate extra site visitors and construct group, but additionally, as a result of that’s what we write about. If we’re going to write down about it, we have to know and perceive it as a lot as doable, in an effort to be sure that what we’re speaking is right, and is smart for our viewers.
On this respect, we’re all the time testing new approaches, apps, instruments, and so forth.
By way of posting, final 12 months, we tried out polls on Twitter and LinkedIn, and query posts on Fb, to see if they might assist drive extra engagement. They usually positively did – a lot of these audience-prompting updates garnered a heap of Likes and feedback. However once we cross-checked this towards Google Analytics monitoring, we didn’t see an enormous uptick in periods or customers visiting the location.
That’s to not say that these aren’t priceless, however they weren’t shifting the needle in any important means on our key metrics. On the identical time, too many polls can get annoying. In our expertise, they’re an fascinating instrument to make use of, carefully, however not a large driver of our final goals.
But, on the identical time, our social site visitors, like all platforms, tends to have ups and downs – and in a down interval this 12 months, we determined to attempt one thing new to clean up the feed and provides our viewers one thing else to interact with, and perhaps lighten the temper a bit of on the identical time.
Enter memes
The inspiration on this occasion got here from SEMRush, who’ve additionally examined out memes as a method to spice up engagement, and construct group.
SEMRush’s expertise noticed them considerably enhance their social engagement by posting well timed, on-trend, area of interest memes. So we thought we’d give it a attempt, to see if that helps drive extra curiosity in our articles.
Step one, after all, is creating related, partaking memes. Which isn’t all the time straightforward. Lots of our memes by no means made it out of take a look at part, with some clearly failing when considered within the templates.
Some that we’ve posted additionally haven’t related in the way in which that we’d hoped.
However that is the sport – should you’re going to put up memes, you’re going to have hits and duds, and also you simply should reside with it. I think about it’s the identical as a comic, a few of the jokes work, some don’t. However ideally, extra of them get fun than not.
Which, fortunately, our memes have.
On common, the memes that we’ve posted are producing round 135 Likes on Fb, which has helped them generate considerably extra attain than our common put up, whereas they’re additionally performing robust on each Twitter and LinkedIn.
They usually’re enjoyable. The best way I view them is just like the comedian part of the standard newspaper, a light-hearted second between the information updates and informational parts.
The elevated engagement clearly has some advantages in boosting algorithmic attain (if individuals have interaction with one in all your posts, the algorithm is extra more likely to present them extra), in addition to constructing group across the SMT model. However the important thing query is – ‘do they really get extra individuals clicking by to the location?’
Outcomes
In our case, when evaluating our general social media efficiency towards the earlier 3 months earlier than we began posting memes, we’ve seen a 12% enhance in periods from social, and a 16% enhance in customers.
That’s not a large shift, however while you’re working with the ebbs and flows of referral site visitors, in addition to adjustments in analytics because of shifting knowledge rules, any enhance is constructive, and a double-digit soar is certainly definitely worth the effort.
That is solely round a month of information, so it’s not definitive, and there are additionally different components to think about that would affect the outcomes. However the numbers, so far, recommend that it’s value sticking with – and as famous, it’s enjoyable too, including a bit of extra relatability to our presence, as opposed simply the newest information.
Just a few different notes:
- Some commenters are going to take your memes actually, regardless of it’s that you simply put up. There’ll all the time be a few feedback like ‘properly, truly, the fact is that…’ Sure. We all know. These are usually not meant to be literal, they’re a second of light-heartedness in amongst our common, advertising strategy-focused information updates.
- We’ve discovered that extra common memes work higher than trending ones. A few memes the place we’ve tried to faucet into information occasions, just like the adjustments to Twitter verification, haven’t accomplished in addition to jokes about extra widespread social media advertising experiences. This additionally, after all, pertains to the memes themselves, and whether or not they’re truly humorous, however in a number of examples, trending matters haven’t been as massive a success.
- Each meme is a little bit of a danger. You’re looking for commonalities along with your viewers, and a few issues that you simply would possibly assume are widespread won’t resonate. It’s worthwhile to know your area of interest, and know your group, which takes some experimentation – and loads of analysis (I’ve been writing about social media traits for eight years)
- One man on LinkedIn retains saying that he’s envious that we’re in a position to get these memes authorized by administration. For people who don’t know, SMT is an editorial crew of two (2) individuals. Approval, on this sense, isn’t precisely a barrier.
- Does it take a very long time to provide you with them? Probably not. We often do them in batches or round 10 at a time, then schedule them out on totally different days/instances throughout FB, Twitter and LinkedIn. We are able to make 10 or so in, perhaps, a few hours, as soon as each week and a half or so. Not a serious dedication.
- We’re at the moment scheduling round one meme a day on every platform, once more, taking that newspaper comedian strategy. Possibly we miss a day right here and there, however that’s the final intention, as one thing to maintain that engagement flowing, and hold the leisure worth up.
Look, it’s not essentially a stroll within the park to maintain arising with humorous memes – and it could be that we run out of concepts at some stage and immediately it turns into much more tough. It’s additionally not for everybody. Arising with a (comparatively) intelligent joke that matches a meme template doesn’t all the time come straightforward, and there are days while you simply don’t have it, regardless of how laborious you stare on the display screen.
However for a minor time dedication, it does appear, a minimum of at this stage, like this can be a great way to assist have interaction your viewers, which may additionally drive direct site visitors advantages.
We’ll put up one other overview of our meme expertise three months in.
