Understanding owned media

The advancement in technology has revolutionised almost every single industry on the planet. From how we interact with friends and family through social media, to how we consume information via search engines, right the way to how we make purchases online, technology is increasingly making our lives easier.

As more and more businesses embrace their digital transformation, whether that is improving their online presence or engaging with customers online, it is important to understand how stakeholders actually perceive different brands and what influences this perception.

Now, while there are a number of factors that ultimately influence how a business is viewed by its customers, certain elements can actually be controlled. We have already covered in previous blog posts the importance of reputation management and how our platforms are designed to assist businesses in engaging with their customers.

However, the focus of this week's blog is to really help you understand the importance of owned media and how any business can benefit from this type of content in the long run.

What is owned media?
Owned media mainly consists of digital marketing channels that a company controls entirely. This basically means a company or individual can articulate their message to their customers and present all their best points in one place.

As online users, we have all come across owned media but most of us have probably not even realised. For example, a website is categorised as owned media as the content has been carefully created by the business owner.

Further examples of owned media include things like blogs, company newsletters and even social media posts on platforms such as Facebook or LinkedIn. All of these are great examples of content that has been distributed electronically but has been created by the company to position themselves in the eyes of their customers.

Why is it important?
Owned media is very important in the information age that we live in. Web users like us want to have access to information about their favourite brands and products or services. The very nature of owned media makes it seamless for prospective customers and current customers to find out more about a business before they commit their time or money.

Often, owned media is considered the starting point for a business’s online marketing efforts. This is primarily because it is a form of media that the company has complete control over and therefore there is less reliance on others and more focus on creating the right type of content that will resonate with the end user.

We have all heard the term, ‘content is king’ and owned media is a great way for businesses to create longevity with their content strategy. For instance, a blog post that is packed with information and contains long-tail keywords will help a business rank their content higher with search engines which will result in more web traffic to their site.

Almost all businesses will have some form of owned media content as they realise it is the starting point of the discovery phase for many customers.

Advantages of owned media
As we have seen already within this week's blog, owned media is an important aspect of how a business positions itself online. There are a number of benefits that a business can experience by having well positioned and created owned media content.

Firstly, unlike other forms of media content, owned media content is something that a business controls. This can remove the dependency for a business to rely on other platforms such as was their ad improved or did they use the right target audience etc. Instead, a business can focus on creating the right type of content that will resonate with the end user.

We touched on our second point above, but reach is another important consideration for owned media. Creating informative posts and content on social media can help a business reach new audiences and potentially rank higher than other forms of media.

As with almost all forms of content, longevity is another benefit of owned media. For example, posts created on social networks or content posted online, generally, never disappears. This means a business can benefit from that content being discovered and shared in the future.

The final advantage of owned media we wanted to cover was the cost effectiveness of owned media. Unlike paid advertising campaigns that require an ad budget, owned media content can be created in-house and distributed for free on a business’s website or social media pages. This makes it a great option for businesses that are looking to market their products or services without a huge amount of money to spend on promotion.

Disadvantages of owned media
While owned media is very effective and is widely used by almost all types of businesses, there are a few drawbacks of relying exclusively on this strategy. For example, as with most types of content, it is time consuming. Creating the right content that impacts the end customer takes careful planning and consideration. As a result, a business will need to devote time and resources in creating owned media content.

Secondly, owned media is more of a long term strategy and will unlikely yield immediate results. For instance, with paid media such as adverts, a business can reach a defined number of people when promoting their products or services. In contrast, with owned media, a business is largely relying on organic methods to reach their audience. Therefore a business will need to invest time in building a database of customers for example, before they then start to see more immediate results of campaigns such as email promotions.

Does it lead to earned media?
Earned media is anything that is written about an individual or business that hasn’t been created or paid for by the individual or business. This type of media content is usually considered third party content often resonates with end users as it’s considered more objective.

Some common examples of earned media include review sites, word of mouth testimonials or even newspaper articles that shine a light on a business and their products or services.

Owned media can definitely lead to earned media. For instance, lets say you create a social media post that is rich in value and then start a paid campaign to promote this content across the platform. You then start to see a number of people engaging with your post and liking, following, sharing and commenting. This in turn produces more engagement and more awareness about your business.

A recent study actually found that earned media is almost 88% more trustworthy to customers than owned media alone, as it is objective and not controlled by a business. The key to gaining earned media is producing consistent and quality owned media content.

Summary
As we have seen in this week's blog, there are a number of aspects to consider when trying to understand owned media. Ultimately, no part of a business’s content strategy and marketing efforts work in isolation. In order to be successful online, every business needs a combination of owned, earned and paid media to reach their audiences on a consistent basis.

To find out more about how you can launch a Digital Agency and help businesses improve their online presence, please contact a member of our team.

Until next time, take care.