Social Media – Paid Earned and Owned Media Explained

Owned

Owned is what belongs to you- something that you control and manage! Using your own Facebook pages and Instagram handles to drive traffic are examples of this. Since this is something that you own, you can reap various benefits. You can easily figure –

• • • Who your customers are
    • What they like and what they don’t
    • Why they come back to you
    • Why they prefer your competitors

Since owned media is completely under your control, you have the power to experiment with it the way you want to.

How to manage owned media:

• • • Communicate who you are: Since it is your own channel, you can leverage this fact to garner accolades towards your brand, without any constraints
    • Engage with your customers the way you want to: There are no restrictions to what you may or you may not do. So go frame your own norms and do your best to connect with your customers
    • Plan you content: Plan content for your website, blogs, and social media accounts. A variety of content could be developed to suit your needs.

Earned

This is the exposure you gain naturally in the process of marketing yourself. Something that you did not directly work for, but rather acquired automatically as a result of your hard work. It can be somewhat referred to as the recognition you receive. How do you know that you are “earning” media –

• • • Positive reviews
    • Reposts/Re-tweets
    • Shares

What makes earned media so amazing is the fact that minimal effort is required from your end. What is not so good about it is the fact that you have little to no control over it, and perhaps this is why things might just go out of hand sometimes. While earned media is most difficult to gain, it is also most effective. There is no limit to the number of people you can reach through earned media.

Paid

Paid is something that you purchase and then promote it on another channel. Ads are the most obvious example of this. Once you use paid media, you are in a way driving traffic to your website. The degree of control is lesser than owned media but more than earned media. At the same time, it helps you go viral like earned media, something that owned media may not promise.  So it is a win-win in most cases. You can advertise on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.

The 2 most effective ways to engage in Paid Media Advertising are:

• • • Promoted Tweets: Once you notice that a tweet of yours on your twitter handle is doing well and garnering attention, you can go ahead and advertise it so that it reaches more people

• • • LinkedIn sponsored updates: Promoting gated content through LinkedIn sponsored updates is widely accepted as a great idea! This is because it takes the “time” factor into consideration. When your audience is on LinkedIn, it is beneficial to have some gated content advertised.