We all know that social media offers a new-age marketing platform and plenty of tools in reaching one’s target audience. Ephemeral content and live streaming are two such tools that instantly connect with the audience. They can have either a long-term or a short-term impact, as per the marketing needs of your brand.

In this article, we will try to make sense of how ephemeral content and live streaming can help your brand connect with consumers, as well as what to use when for an effective marketing strategy.

Ephemeral content

Ephemeral content lasts for a short 24 hours on Snapchat, Facebook and Instagram ‘stories’. It literally feeds on the concept of FOMO (fear of missing out) among us human beings.

The content on these platforms are created with a narrow focus and clearly defined purpose to make maximum impact. This elicits an immediate response from the audience as the content is relatable and speaks in a personal tone.

In accordance with your branding/marketing strategies, it bodes well to continue posting relevant stories that keep your users engaged. These short bursts of ephemeral stories help build a loyalty base. By being consistent and creating volumes of stories – which need not be polished or expensive – you can create a brand engagement strategy without high costs attached to it.

Give the audience a peek into your day-to-day operations. This could include – what goes behind the scenes of making an advertisement, create user value by showing the product’s features.

Ephemeral content works well for online retail companies too. You can post videos, memes, or images and entice people with a clear call to action (CTA). You could achieve this by offering discounts or linking to your shopping page.

If you or your company engages in social causes, you could offer an insight into your humane activities and keep visitors hooked. You could use polls, nametags, geolocations, hashtags etc. as they relate to the empathetic tone of your stories.

These visual concepts (videos, memes, images) can help build a constant viewership for your company and meet the purpose effectively.

Live streaming

Live streaming can be a very effective tool in building a long-lasting relationship with your audience as it allows for a one-on-one engagement.

There are many platforms that offer live streaming that help you to take advantage of a very large audience. This includes social media giants like Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, etc.

If you know you have something interesting to share or a brand story to tell your viewers, where you can ‘humanize’ an inanimate product and help create a buzz around it via live streaming, you must go for it.

The downside of a livestreaming session could be trolling and how to firefight it on a live platform.

If you’re well-prepared, live streaming can not only become a place for a direct source of revenue but also a channel to educate passionate and dispassionate viewers regarding your brand and turn them positively towards your product.

Parting Words

Neither of these platforms needs to be perfectly coiffed to meet your audience’s expectations. It is the ‘rawness’ of the format that really connects with them. The ease and the low cost involved in content creation should motivate you to keep a constant flow and rhythm in generating content with a focus and purpose regarding your brand.

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