Creating Stand-Out Twitter Ads This Holiday Season

• Read original article here

It’s that time again! The holiday season is upon us and before you know it, we’ll all be scouring social media looking for gift ideas, seasonal recipes, and more. As a marketer, you know this can be a crucial time to get your brand out into the world. And what better way to do that than by running an ad campaign?

This article has a few tips for creating Twitter ads that will stand out in a busy feed, helping you to gain more brand exposure and generate some sales in the process.

Here are eight things to keep in mind as you begin planning and creating your Twitter ads:

When it comes to holiday-related social media marketing, the sooner you get started, the better. You never want to want until the last minute to plan and create your content. It only creates a lot of stress, particularly if you’re planning to run Twitter ads.

Creating a great ad takes time. Not only does the ad need to be approved before it can run on the platform, but you’ll also need to allot time for testing. Tweaking copy and visuals is all part of testing to see which ad produces the best response from your audience. Only then will you know what truly resonates. This then allows you to then put more money behind your top-performing ad, ultimately delivering your desired results.

Before you dive in and start developing your copy and visuals, you need to first choose the overall objective of your campaign. Why are you running an ad in the first place? Is your goal to increase brand awareness, gain more followers, get website clicks, or something else? Knowing what your campaign objective is will help you determine what kind of ad to run and it’ll tell you which Twitter metrics to track.

When running ads on any social media platform, you need to ensure your content meets your target audience where they’re at. What that means is, you likely won’t generate the best results if you’re promoting a high-ticket offering to an entirely new audience. They haven’t had time to get to know you and build that relationship yet.

Instead, you’ll likely want to focus on running an ad that’s going to boost brand awareness. Create a fun holiday promo that shares what your brand is all about. Or if you have a special sale that you’ll be running or a new low-ticket offer to promote, you can create ads around those things.

Although Twitter gives you a total of 280 characters, the ideal length of a tweet appears to be between 240 and 259 characters. Tweets this length seem to get the most likes, retweets, and replies. And since you want your Twitter ads to be successful, this kind of engagement is key.

Aim to keep your copy on the shorter side by getting straight to the point. Twitter doesn’t allow much space for rambling anyway. This way, you’ll be able to clearly communicate the information you want people to know and share what action to take next (if any). If you’re feeling the holiday vibes, you may even want to throw in a seasonal pun!

With over 500 million tweets being posted per day, it’s no wonder your Twitter feed is a busy place. As a result, it’s easy for your ad to get lost in the crowd. To compete against all those other tweets out there, it’s smart to use visuals that are going to grab attention and get people to stop scrolling as soon as they see it. Since it’s the holiday season, consider adding some festive elements to any graphics you use (think lights, Santa hats, etc.).

If you’re willing to take it one step further, you can ditch the static image and opt for a video instead. Why? Because video advertising is beneficial for small businesses. Videos are amazing at storytelling and helping you to connect with your audience. They’re perfect for prompting an emotional response and even tugging at heartstrings. And ultimately, that’s great for boosting engagement and sales.

When it comes to video Twitter ads, you need to make sure you grab their attention in the first few seconds. Otherwise, people are going to scroll onto something else. Come up with a strong opener for your video that will leave viewers wanting to watch the rest.

Also, it would be wise to keep it on the shorter side overall. While video ads can be up to 2:20 in length, Twitter suggests aiming for 15 seconds or less. That’s not much time to work with, but you can go longer. Just make the video as long as needed to get your point across.

(By the way, Twitter gives select advertisers the ability to request a time increase of up to 10 minutes. You’ll need to contact your Twitter Account Manager to learn more.)

Arguably one of the most important parts of an advertising campaign is the call to action (CTA). This is what encourages people to take that next step with your brand. It could be visiting your site to read a blog post, signing up for your email list, or even making a purchase. It all depends what the goal of your campaign is. Write a clear call to action so people know exactly what they’re expected to do next. Again, this is why it’s smart to do some A/B split testing with your Twitter ads. It’ll help you choose which CTA performs the best overall.

While many people write off the social media influencers of the world, there’s no denying that influencer marketing has major benefits. It’s great for getting more exposure for your brand and can even boost your credibility since someone is essentially vouching for you.

If there’s an influencer who you feel aligned with and who has an audience you want to target, consider working with them for your holiday Twitter ads campaign. When an audience sees their favorite influencer raving about a product or service, they’ll see it as a ringing endorsement. And they’ll be more likely to check out your brand and even make a purchase. It can be a powerful way to boost sales as the year comes to a close.