3 Storytelling Tools to Enhance Your Social Media Marketing Efforts - Part Deux

Updated: Jul 16, 2018

Originally posted on Social Media Today.

After the response to my previous article about storytelling in social media, I decided I wasn't done.

Storytelling has never been more important to social media marketing than it is today. With content flowing from every direction, we need to find ways to make sense of it all and choose on what to focus our attention. And since human communication is driven by storytelling, creating a visual manifestation of messages helps marketers connect better with their audiences and produces more memorable impressions.

So what can you do to get more attention for your social media campaign? Here are my new favorite enhancement platforms.

1. Promo

The busy social media world is the perfect environment for short, shareable videos to flourish. Among the unfathomable amount of content we encounter on a daily basis, video is by far the most engaging, surpassing images and text.

As video gets greater organic reach on Facebook, and brands have more than doubled their video production, more organizations are realizing the power of video. The need for quality videos to communicate with customers, generate brand awareness, and product promotion is on the rise.

Promo is a B2B video creation service powered by, that makes video creation easy. Gone are the days where you schedule outside shooting days, rent expensive equipment and spend time and money on post-production - Promo is an all-in-one service that helps you produce 15 seconds videos fast. It offers a selection of over 2 million premium video clips, so you can choose the video that's right for your industry. You can then add music without worrying about usage issues, with a wide selection of music with lifetime licensing.

The best part is that after you've selected your video clip, added the music, your text and logo, the service generates a ready-to-share video within seconds, saving you the time and hassle that was once a part of the video creation process. This also means you have the ability to create as many videos as you need to keep viewers interested - you can create a series of videos that form a bigger storyline and schedule to publish the videos apart in a timely manner to create anticipation and form an audience.

2. Giphy

The Graphic Interchange Format owes its claim to social media fame to Tumblr, the site that popularized it in recent years. And the trend isn't showing signs of slowing down - GIFs can now be found across more social media platforms, with many now offering in-stream GIF search tools and options.

GIFs are a great way to communicate reactions that words can't always deliver, interactively giving context to posts. The result can be a memorable, fun message that gets users' attention faster.

Using Giphy, you can search for existing GIFs by typing a specific topic or an emotion the GIF should express. You can also create your GIF by converting images and videos into short, embeddable snippets of content.

Paramount Pictures was one company that saw the marketing potential in GIFs and partnered with Giphy to create memorable scenes from the original Terminator movie, to promote its new movie, Terminator Genisys. Movie fans received a modern twist on the iconic images associated with the film series, bringing back nostalgic memories and generating movie buzz.

3. Periscope

Live streaming is a growing phenomenon that will continue to dominate our social feeds in the future. There's no doubt that live video adds the human touch we need in order to connect in the digital realm. It gives the viewers a sense of urgency and invites them to watch a story as it unfolds. And as mobile use continues to skyrocket, we'll likely see more live video streaming platforms take center stage.

One such platform is Periscope. Periscope lets you stream live videos from your smartphone and reach your audience on the go. People can join your broadcast, comment, and like it by clicking on the hearts on the screen. Once it's over, any video you've created is saved to your phone and is essentially treated like any other video. This is a great tool that can help you build a loyal audience. You can use it to create "how to" videos, behind the scenes, product demos and launches, which you can later upload to your YouTube channel.

Brands are slowly taking advantage of this tool and they're getting creative. Doritos was the first brand to run a contest through Periscope. Their roulette game engaged viewers on Twitter and Vine in addition to Periscope and promoted the launch of a new product, Doritos Roulette. This multi-channel tactic proved successful, as Doritos was able to reach its audience on all three platforms, while inviting each group to follow the brand on other networks as well.

Storytelling will continue to drive social engagement as brands strive to find creative ways to reach their customers. With all the noise that surrounds us, we're drawn to captivating stories that stand out from the rest.

Using the right tools, you can step up your social media game and communicate better with your audience, as you create the right messages they're looking for.

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© 2018 by Philip Kushmaro - Digital Marketing Ambassador