Book Takeaways from Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook: How to Tell Your Story in a Noisy Social World. Author: Gary Vaynerchuk.
Over 3.6 billion people use social media worldwide in 2020, and the number was anticipated to climb to 4.41 billion in 2025, according to the report on Statistics.com (Clement, 2020). Nowadays, our daily lives are highly involved with social media; social platforms became a vital battleground for businesses to win consumers. The book "Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook" emphasizes the critical principle of developing successful online marketing is not directly posting boring sales information, asking people to purchase right away. Instead, it is about strategy; Social media approaches are similar to a boxing game. In the competitive and face-paced environment, throwing right jabs continually before the right hook is the key to win. Marketers should "give, give, give, and ask" - constantly deliver value content, engage with consumers, and not rush consumers to purchase until the right moment. Even though it may take time, it will build a solid relationship between brands and consumers that will convert traffic into ROI.
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Content strategy achieves the killer hook. Author, Gary Vaynerchuk, introduces vital components of strategic jabs, including storytelling techniques that emotionally resonate with the audience, keep disseminating micro-content that is funny, informative, and align with the business identity. However, multiple social sites have their own personality and climate. A hit post on Facebook may not speak to Twitter's audience. As the book says, "Content is king. Context is God." While keeping up with the trendy topics, we should distinguish nuances in different platforms and tailor business content to adapt to the "native language" of each site and to interact with the users. Also, there are various features we can utilize on platforms for promoting, such as sponsored stories on Facebook, the trending-tracking tool on Twitter, Pinboard on Pinterest, and GIF features on Tumblr.
The book helps provide many examples that demonstrate the elements of appropriate posts and show pitfalls that may damage a brand's presence. I am surprised that many well-established companies, such as Subaru and Levi's, fail to present suitable online content. It gives me a critical eye to evaluate posts on my feeds and to improve future posts. I started thinking deeper while scrolling through the social sites and asked myself if the influencers have made a good copy? How can I adjust the image/text to demonstrate the right voice and to make it eye-catching? What hashtags can I create to fit the trend?
Furthermore, while browsing some well-established companies’ social media, I found some weaknesses on the sites. The "too" corporate presence is one of the problems that make it irrelevant to the audience. As the example of Microsoft: Riding the Waves (Vaynerchuk, 2013, p.94), the company composed a creative post with a quality image and text that brings excitement to the community. It is an excellent way to show the fun/multiple sides of a stiff company and improve the brand's social image by making valuable captions and photos delivering the right voice.
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Many social sites and new platforms are emerging and creating new business opportunities, such as eSports and live streaming. In order to shine in the fast-paced environment, we, as marketers, need to be sensitive to the trends, be proactive in facing changes, and also be bold to try/jab. At the same time, we need to be cautious, be aware of the text/graphic/voice in the context. We should also stand in the audiences' perspective to create compelling content that connects with them. Keeping jabbing with quality content is what we need to focus on — paying attention to context to formulate meaningful, "infotainment" posts that can combat the 7-second attention span and attract audiences. Then, connecting with communities by these powerful jabs can eventually lead to a successful hook, making people purchase. It is challenging, but it is the reason that makes marketing so fascinating!
References
Vaynerchuk, G. (2013). Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook: How to Tell Your Story in a Noisy Social World
New York: Harper Business
Clement, J. (2020). Number of global social network users 2017-2025. Statistics. Retrieved October 30th, 2020, from
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