PR Agencies Need to Separate Engagement From Acquisition in Social Media Campaigns, Says Punch
As the discipline of using social media effectively within a PR or communications campaign matures, agencies need to understand the key differences between the two activities in order to maximise the cycle that will ultimately create a better social environment and grow a community virally.
Punch has defined the two phases as being distinct. Engagement is defined as the process of curating content and editorialising about either that content or other 'social objects' - effectively subject matter. In Facebook or Twitter for example, this might take the form of multiple micro-announcements, with a calendar plan geared towards the continual distribution of relevant and interesting content via these social channels.
Acquisition is centred upon activities that are intended to stimulate a community's growth - such as search engine based activities, activities that incorporate a share function within Facebook or are intended to facilitate redistribution via re-tweets in Twitter.
Pete Goold, Managing Director of Punch Communications, which started life as a traditional PR agency in 2003, commented:
'The key to an effective social media campaign is to understand the fundamental difference between engagement and acquisition - the former being the ability to stimulate an audience and to create the best possible community environment to ensure that a visitor has a reason to stay once they arrive - and the latter focused upon delivering a reason for a visitor to join in the first place.'
Punch currently manages social media outreach campaigns for clients of all sizes across sites such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
