Social proof is a must-have tool for every marketer nowadays. If you are looking for well-tried ways to increase the credibility of your brand, then there is nothing more useful than using social proof for the sake of your brand voice.
Social proof has come to marketing from psychology. There is nothing surprising in the fact that modern marketing uses a lot of psychological tricks, but social proof is a kind of special phenomenon.
Initially, the term “social proof” was used to describe the common behavior of people in any uncertain situation. We all seek the approval of experts, neighbors, relatives, friends, or even random people with the experience we do not yet possess. Social proof shows us how the community reacts to a certain thing and dictates our own behavior towards it.
Social Proof
Social proof influences our decisions nearly always. It is especially strong when we want to try something new and unexplored before. That is why the wise usage of the potential of social proof is so important for your marketing strategy: you will be able to influence the behavior of your potential customers through an implicit advertisement of your products or services.
Think about the modern social media that surround us. What do we usually see there? Basically, the social media environment is the place where different people talk about their attitude to various events. The most common event for each modern human is a purchase of some product or service and an attempt to share this experience with the biggest number of other people possible.
Social proof is actually the result of such an activity. We buy something and react to it — and this reaction creates social proof. Wise marketers never miss such kind of user-generated content to promote their products or services. Let us try to implement the main tricks of social proof marketing for your brand.
How to Get Social Proof
Before using social proof, we need to learn how to get it. Popular trademarks have tons of social proof, but new brands do not have such an advantage. The question of getting social proof is actually the question of being popular among potential customers. Here are some basic ways to get social proof, even for recently created brands.
Use customer feedback
Testimonials are one of the oldest ways to influence your potential customers with the help of the real ones` feedback. Despite being as old as the internet itself, testimonials are still working well for most types of products and services.
For newly created brands, it is highly important to encourage users to send their feedback or to share it through social networks. Every brand has an opportunity to create contests, giveaways, and other involving events to make the feedback process interesting for customers. The usage of branded hashtags should be the required condition for all users who participate in the connected events.
Some brands might find out that their previous customers have already left the precious feedback without informing the company about it. Search forums and turn on Google notifications by your brand name to collect all social proof you possibly can.
Associate with other reputable brands
Do not hesitate to collaborate with other brands in your industry. Use every opportunity to showcase your partners — it will help to associate your new brand with something more familiar and trustworthy among your potential customers.
You can start by getting official stamps of such social media leaders like Google, Instagram, Facebook, etc. It is not that difficult to get the certificates of approval for your official social pages and then use the stamps of these prominent brands as proof of your reliability.
Involve industry experts
Every expert opinion is more valuable than regular customer feedback. Try to involve the experts of your industry to evaluate your product or service and use their feedback as an ultimate advertisement of your brand.
It is also very useful to involve celebrities in your advertisement campaign to gain a powerful injection of customers` interest. Although not every new brand can afford such spendings, they are usually hundreds of times worth the expenses.
How to Use Social Proof
Let us imagine you already have tons of social proof. How to use it then? The best option would be to collect all pieces of social proof in one place (presumably your company’s website) and showcase it in the best way possible. Luckily, there is a dedicated tool that allows you to create any social media feed you want without any special skills or knowledge in web development and design.
Flow-Flow social media streaming plugin is your key advantage in the competitive struggle for social proof in the modern marketing world. You will be able to create any type of social stream in a matter of minutes. For example, a WordPress Facebook feed would be a piece of cake even for inexperienced website admins.
The main advantages of the Flow-Flow social media streaming plugin are:
- user-friendly and intuitive interface, suitable even for newbies in website administration;
- powerful customization opportunities available with no web development and design skills;
- pre-moderation feature for your branded streams based on hashtag posts from social media users;
- the opportunity to mix different social media sources (12 different social networks available) within one stream;
- 40+ social media feed types (including the opportunity to stream public business accounts, hashtags, posts by location ID, and so on);
- free demo version to estimate the main features of the plugin.
Conclusion
Social proof is a powerful marketing tool that needs to be used by any newly created brand to gain its audience. Although getting social proof is the first step of your branding campaign, there is also a very important second step — the actual implementation of social proof. Use Flow-Flow to make your second and decisive step easier and more effective!
