What Happens After a Story Completes Production?
So you’ve produced a story. Then what? Regardless of what format you used - video, audio, written, multimedia, etc - producing content is only half the process. When a story has completed production, what’s the next step? And how does digital marketing fit into the storytelling process?
As the digital storytelling platform of the Singapore International Foundation, at Our Better World (OBW), we distribute our stories online through our website and social media platforms including, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube. These platforms are where we reach a majority of our audiences.
So how does OBW reach our audiences? Let’s go behind the scenes to peek at the work of OBW’s Promotions Team.
Let me introduce you to OBW’s promotions team - which is really two teams together: the Community Team and the Data Analytics/Digital Marketing team.
The promotion process begins with the Community Team reaching out to our Story Subjects to find out how we can help them achieve their desired objectives from the publication of their story on our platform. Then during our Promotions Team discussion, they provide a recap on what they’ve learned from the conversation and we discuss how we can meet two goals: increase awareness about the work of our story subject and get them the help that they need.
How do we achieve this? I’ll be using What A Waste, a story we released in May 2021, as a case study to demonstrate our approach to the distribution of our stories.
About What A Waste
What A Waste is an organisation that rescues perishable food which is then cooked and delivered to the B40 community - the bottom 40 percent of income earners in Malaysia. It’s goal is to feed the hungry, provide livelihood and stop food wastage.
Identifying our Target Audience
Our producers label each of our stories into specific causes to assist us in identifying possible interests in audience targeting. The story and its cause are then categorised on our site. In this instance, the story falls under the environment theme.
The first thing to consider is who exactly we’re trying to reach. Who would be interested in this story? Since What A Waste falls under the environment theme, we brainstormed for groups and interests that would fit within this category. We discussed the possibility of targeting audiences concerned about the environment, with particular interest in reducing food wastage or people interested in cooking or meal preparation.
With this broad segmentation in mind, we dived into each platform to seek out specific interests belonging to these categories. Interests we found on social media platforms that we included in our targeting were food waste, environmental protection and waste management.
Feeding lives and livelihoodsA mother of six, Wati used to only have RM2 (USD 0.48) in her pocket. Today, she puts food on the table for her family- thanks to What A Waste’s B40* Partner Cooks Programme. A social enterprise, What A Waste feeds, employs and empowers low-income communities. Their team of food warriors cover ground across Kuala Lumpur everyday to rescue edible food surplus and send them back to cooks like Wati so that they can be made into delicious meals for the community. Learn how What A Waste turns food waste into ways of feeding Malaysia’s urban poor. *B40 refer to the bottom 40% of income earners in Malaysia
Người đăng: Our Better World vào Thứ Sáu, 28 tháng 5, 2021
Identifying the Story’s Key Message
Now that we know who our target audiences are, the next thing to consider is the key message that would resonate with this group of audience. Being a digital storytelling platform based in Singapore telling stories from across Asia, we’re mindful to ensure that our messaging should resonate with audiences across the region.
For instance, after watching the video and giving our individual reflections, the Promotions Team agreed that Wati, one of the story’s profiles, would be the most relatable across our target audience segments. Since Wati’s journey as a beneficiary of What A Waste was shown in the story, we used a similar angle when crafting our key messages.
Formating Our Advertisements
Besides messaging, we needed to decide on the ad formats that can most effectively bring the message across. Should it be an image? A video? If so, what’s the video’s duration?
This process would include reviewing our creative assets from producers to see what we could use. Typically, the team’s preference is for video assets since they’re generally more engaging, particularly in storytelling.
The team then decided to create a 15s video to capture Wati’s perspective succinctly and at the same time showing our audiences how What A Waste provided her with job stability and a source of income.
Overall, our campaign saw 1.1 million views with 1.4k shares and 299 comments interacting with the content.
Does This Mean a Guaranteed Success?
These are just some guidelines that can help you promote your content on social. It’s important to remember that sometimes, even taking these steps does not ensure a good outreach for your story since there are many variables involved in an online ad’s performance. But these are the basics that you should do to give your story a fighting chance to capture your online audience on social. It’s constantly about finding out what works for you and your audiences, refining your plans and remembering that there’s no right formula to selecting your audiences, messaging or ad formats.
