2022 Digital Marketing Trend: Social Proofing More Critical Than Ever
Word of mouth is a marketing tool as old as time itself. From the first Homo Sapiens that ate berries and told their other cave-dwellers how tasty they were, driving berry demand, people have always trusted their friends and family when it comes to making decisions. That is the essence of social proofing.
And while social proofing has always been important to marketers even before the digital era, we now have the data to precisely measure how impactful it can be (hint: it varies based on industry and how it’s conducted).
Let’s dive in a bit further into how social proofing is specifically a big digital marketing trend in 2022.
How Social Proofing Impacts Sales
IDE director Sinan Aral examined 71 different products across 25 product categories purchased by 30 million people on WeChat. The study revealed that by inserting social proofing into advertisements, click-through rates skyrocketed (for some products).
Heineken, for instance, saw a 271% increase in click-through rates, while Disney’s interactions only rose by 21%.
Now, 21% is still impressive, but this speaks to social proofing’s differentiated returns based on category of product.
There are of course a number of variables that could have impacted the click-through rate, but we can assume that something like literal taste – the enjoyment one gets from drinking or eating something – is perhaps more trusted by people than figurative taste – in Disney’s case, how enjoyable its shows or amusement parks are.
Source: Trustmary
Insights like these can help drive your marketing efforts in 2022, especially as more data like this becomes available.
And with so many social media platforms with literally billions of people on them, the ability to access social proofing has never before been so easy.
Supercharge Your Sales Funnels With Social Proofing
Now that we know how effective social proofing can be in the right situation, it’s time to start making it a part of your marketing tool kit. Increase those click-throughs, get your potential customers to take the leap down the sales funnel, and boost sales: simple (if not always easy!).
If you want to learn more about accelerating customers down your sales funnel with leading-edge digital marketing tools, find out how we help some of Canada’s biggest businesses maximize their digital marketing budgets. Talk to us.
