Munchie Marketing: Four Must Know Snacking Trends for a Successful Social Media Marketing Campaign
IntroductionDid you know that 94% of Americans are voracious snackers? Did you also know that snackers are largely comprised of Millennials? Millennials snack as much as four times a day, and they dominate the entire snack industry. Social media marketing is driving up snack sales and causing rampant growth in the healthy snack industry. They are redefining the traditional snack and transforming the snack into a meal. Americans are moving away from the concept of “three squares” into readily accessible food on-demand and ultimately redefining how we eat.
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So what does this mean for “Munchie Marketing?” Apparently, social media marketing is critical to success in the snack food industry. Based on a recent Nielson report Millennials spend about 27 hours a week on social media, following very closely behind Generation X clocking in at 32 hours per week via mobile devices including smartphones and tablets.i
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Snacking Must Be Shareable
For Millennials, their choice of snack strongly tied to social media marketing. Therefore, to successfully compete in today’s snack marketing, it is imperative that snack companies build and maintain a strong social media marketing campaign. According to research by Barkley and the Boston Consulting Group, 15% of Millennials interact with a brand’s social media account once a month. 53% of Millennials check out brands on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Significantly, upwards of 35% showed they like the brand more if they are active on social media.ii
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Peer Friendly Content
Of the almost 18 hours a day Millennials spend consuming media online – the majority of the content consumed are those created by peers. This means, for your social media marketing to succeed and resonate with Millennials, the content posted must at the very minimum possess the attributes of media created by like-minded peers. Of particular relevance to “Munchy Marketing,” Millennials pay close attention to online reviews and social media posts.
Apparently, 41% of Millennials have tried a “better for you” snack because of an online rating or review. And, 37% have tried a “better for you” snack option because of a social media post made by a friend.iii An overwhelming 95% of Millennials trust peer endorsements as the most credible source of product information.iv These are important statistics to keep in mind as you build your social media marketing campaign.
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Anything Can Be a Snack
A study by Mintel research found that 70% of Millennials believe anything can be a snack, from chips to protein bars and shakes to leftover pizza and carrot sticks. For Millennials on the go, snacks make sense because they bypass a traditional sit down meal. Snacking currently accounts for up to 50% of all “meal occasions” and is steadily gaining traction as society progressively moves toward increasingly more hyper virtual interactions.v
Accordingly, any company in the business of selling food in small on-the-go packages must invest in a strong social media marketing campaign. The social media marketing campaign must be strategic to capture the millennial market through a continuous stream of entertainment and infotainment. The content should creatively combine images and video including live streaming video to cause engagement. To succeed, your social media marketing campaign must truly resonate with, capture the attention of, and arouse the emotions of the target peer group.
Copyright © 2017 Trinet Internet Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved
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Snacking as a Healthy Way of Life
Unlike their older counterparts, Millennials do not view snacking as a means to quell hunger between meals. At least 39% snack to stay energized and focused throughout the day. A snack is much more than a means to satisfy the “munchies” or a passing craving. One’s choice of snack is becoming highly representative of lifestyle choices, and evidencing the growing importance of eating with purpose. This means that your social media marketing campaign must also focus on enhancing lifestyles.
Consequently, the growth in the snack industry has been explosive, with the past year alone revealing a year on year increase in snack food sales by a whopping 23%.vi Based on a recent study by Amplify Snack Brands, Millennials are the main drivers behind the “better-for-you” snacks. Millennials are much more pre-disposed to consider the type of snack they are consuming relative to its impact on their health. This means Millennials are more studied and conscientious about what they are consuming which reveals to the social media marketing team at Trinet that campaigns promoting snacks must share this same focus.
Of course, for any social media marketing campaign to make headway into your consumer demographic, it must prioritize posts that are fresh, interesting, and relevant. A successful social media marketing campaign must go a few steps further. To truly resonate, attract and arouse, a social media marketing campaign must prioritize understanding the target customers for that product.
It’s not enough just to have a social media presence. Boring, uninspired posts placed online solely for the purpose of posting something to make it look like there is activity on your social media channels is a waste of time. Are your social media posts actually reaching bona fide customer prospects? Or are your social media posts primarily read and followed by people who are unlikely to ever buy from you? The way to figure this out is to do an analysis of the profiles of a sampling of your followers. If the sampling reveals that most of your followers are not prospects, you need to rethink your social media marketing strategy starting with profiling of who you need to reach, and messaging to reach them. Trinet can help you do this, and put in place a solid social media marketing strategy that works to reach prospects, not duds.
As the definition of meal and snack continues to blur, understanding the dynamics behind millennial snacking can create better marketing opportunities and provide clearer direction. A great social media marketing campaign relies on historical data to generate insights as to what can be expected and anticipated, as well as fact gather to arrive at intelligent guesses as to the future of where it is headed. Successful social media marketing campaigns begin by carefully studying and understanding the target persona, the content they are consuming in real life, and in real time. To have an impact, the social media marketing campaign must weave itself into the daily lives of its targets, provoking, stimulating, challenging, and even inciting, to arrive at an emotion that resonates with the product.
In summary, there”s no benefit to building social media pages that don’t reach the right audience. Great social media content must be fresh, out of the box, unique, and dialed in to the way target prospects think and feel. So don’t go it alone. Worse, don’t hire an intern to manage your social media brand. Get the professionals. At Trinet, our team has a deep understanding of how to do this, and how to get results for you that are creative, out of the box, and get attention. Our team is ready to turn your social media brand into a money spout, instead of a time and money drain.
Trinet’s digital advertising experts are ready to help you with strategies that drive your digital marketing success in 2017. With 23 years of experience, over 1500 digital projects and more than 95 industry awards – Trinet can take your social media marketing to the next level. Call today and get started 949.442.8900.
