Interesting is the best way to summarize all that brands need to be today. Brands are no longer your baby. They are fast becoming adrenaline-pumping, high-action living things that are transcending boundaries, breaking stereotypes, leading ideologies, and dialogues in a world where attention is the most sought-after commodity. In times of 15 seconds of fame, TikTok, Instagram, and a global pandemic, digital marketing campaigns are becoming the next big thing! Needless to say, they matter, and here’s Liridon Vrapca sharing the secret to building powerful digital marketing campaigns in 2020.
“Honesty will never go out of fashion,” says the 29-year-old social media expert and self-proclaimed (and certified) technology geek. Vrapca has been keeping a hawk-eye vision on the rapid developments in our social settings, especially of the online variety. “While everything is changing,” observes Vrapca, “one thing has remained consistent—the allure of honesty.” This, according to Vrapca “is the secret tool that almost all brands have in common, but only the most intuitive ones know how to apply.”
Honesty might seem like an easy thing, but most of us know it can be tough to apply it in one’s own life, let alone in the life of one’s brand. Yet, Vrapca insists authenticity to be the key, “A powerful digital marketing campaign is one with a genuine emotional connection. Joy is the best emotion to tap into, especially right now.” And, why not, with the pandemic raging like a growing forest fire, a good laugh is back in business as the best medicine.
Stories and people go back to the beginning, therefore, “Campaigns that tell real stories of real people, especially those overcoming the odds add a warm, human tint to a brand.” Their impact and need seem to be primal, and the connection that “a genuine, comforting and deeply joyful campaign can have on people stays, and sticks.” Vrapca cites Dove Men’s and Tesco’s heart-warming Father’s Day campaigns as ideal examples because they “pick up from where life left, and by keeping it real, you keep it close to the audience’s heart.” These campaigns “flip the stereotype, bring a pleasant change into focus, and win hearts by keeping things simple and real.”
According to Vrapca, “Brands that are honest often tend to share their secrets with their customers and treat them like people they know and respect.” They give an inside story of their business, talk about their goals and concerns as a business, share their mistakes so others can learn from them. Vrapca believes that “Educating your customer as a part of your campaign is like inviting them to be part of the process, of the success without them ever knowing it. It’s like building a family.”
Vrapca believes that powerful digital marketing campaigns must keep one foot in tradition and the other in the future. “Traditional marketing has some valuable lessons to give, which are, be authentic, know your TG, set your goal, and know your customer. Forgetting these timeless lessons will be like throwing the baby with the bathwater.” Vrapca adds, “One must think of new-age marketing as old ideas on an endless conveyor belt. They must be snappy, witty, cute, funny, whimsical, and at all times, honest.” Honesty, Vrapca believes, is the heart of digital marketing campaigns and one to consider seriously if a brand has sustainable success written on its to-do list.