Real-time marketing and newsjacking are often used as synonyms. And while all (successful) newsjacking is RTM, not all RTM is newsjacking. And that’s a good thing.
Newsjacking is not a strategy
With the utmost respect to David Meerman Scott, the clever folks in the war rooms at 360i, and the digital marketers who just want to accelerate the flow through their marketing funnels, “jacking” is not good. It’s almost always a bad sign embedded in a word. Think for a moment about your vocabulary of words containing or ending in “-jacking” . . .
. . . my full list comes to carjacking, hijacking, and lowjacking, and if I’m really stretching, skyjacking and blackjacking, none of which are traditionally related to advantageous business strategies. Jacking comes with pejorative baggage that already seems to be infecting what, from my exhaustive search, is the sole example of a positive word containing jacking.
In the most benevolent interpretation, newsjacking conveys the sort of heroism that brings 5000 leads into the funnel in a period of minutes with fast-thinking, creativity, and the blessed absence of bureaucratic approval processes for marketing content.
But, newsjacking is a tricky business. It usually doesn’t deserve the benevolent interpretation because it usually falls flat. Most newsjacked content earns less than 100 shares, which is certainly not enough attention to risk one’s personal or brand-related integrity. The downsides of newsjacking range from befuddling to outraging one’s audience, for example, consider the following examples of newsjacking.
Befuddling
Stretching
Insensitive
Offensive
Outrage Inducing
The upsides of newsjacking are limited for most would-be jackers. One study found that the median increase in followers is 1.7% . . .and that was for the brands with newsjacking “wins.”
Since reaching it’s peak in the 2013 Superbowl, newsjacking seems to have taken on an air of desperation, with frantic and overworked social media marketers glomming on to an event, whether or not it’s in or related to their industry or even part of a conversation or subject matter that makes sense to join.
And when you get to the bottom line, newsjacking is a tactic and ought to be treated as just one, judiciously used tool in the marketer’s toolbox.
Real-time Marketing
Newsjacking is the promise of that one clever, perfectly timed tweet that solves all of your lead-generation problems (at least for a little while). Real-time marketing is a beacon that guides a marketing strategy. It starts with a strategic decision to adapt and refine your content selectively around conversations or events that you can enhance or expand to benefit your brand or your marketing efforts.
Real-time marketing is a nimble approach, not related just to riding a trending news topic, but to authentically participating in a conversation or moment that makes sense, for brand or professional purposes, to participate in with the goal of elevating the conversation (while, of course, benefiting from the lifting effects of appealing to your audience and demonstrating your expertise in a relevant topic).
The golden pieces of real-time marketing can be found in campaigns that are just a part of a brand’s overall approach.
Warby Parker’s Customer Service videos demonstrate real-time marketing coupling with a well-thought out execution in order to maintain their overall brand’s message. Warby Parker’s customer service team answers questions asked by customers on Youtube.
The downside of real-time marketing is, in the worst case scenario, that your offering to the conversation of the industry less than you would like. The benefit of contributing to real-time conversations in your space is that it will, at bare minimum, be about subject matter that fits within your expertise and will never leave your audience wondering what you were thinking.
When you do it real-time marketing right, you prove your brand is at the leading edge of trending topics, that you can be trusted for a position on the issues of interest to your industry and customer base, and that you earn a long-term boost from this trusted advisor status. A recent piece from Chris Copeland from AdAge, summarizes real-time marketing in an appropriate manner as he states “Every advertiser looking to reach a given audience should know how to be authentic and enhance the moments they wish to be associated.” Brands shouldn’t be clamoring to find the next “black out moment” or the next royal birth (that’s news-jacking), instead brands need to look for the “real” moments happening now that embrace their overall message for genuine human connection.
Unclear what category your recent marketing may fall under? Here’s a more visual breakdown to what has been described above.