Faye Williams is the MD of Flabbergast, a social media agency for visionary brands, leveraging data and AI-powered analytics to grow customer fanbases for brands of all sizes.
Flabbergast helps brands across consumer, music, and entertainment with their social media strategy, social-first content ideation and production, social media management, paid media, creator partnerships, IRL activations, and everything in between.
We asked Faye to share some tips and tricks for founders on leading successful social media campaigns that bring results.
Tell us about Flabbergast and how it is different from other social media agencies?
We’ve leveraged our extensive experience in nurturing and growing fame and fan bases at industry giants like Universal Music, Island Records, Warner Music, Broadwick Live, and more to build powerful followings for brands of all sizes, from startups to global giants.
Our team takes a creative and insight-driven approach for our music and brand clients. We’re social natives who stay tapped into trends and culture while geeking out on the stats to turn engagement into business results using captivating content that resonates culturally, backed by data.
Authenticity is the key word, aim to strike a balance of your content feeling real and personable enough to be relatable, but inspiring enough for your audience to keep watching.
How is Flabbergast leveraging AI to enhance social media campaigns, and what advice do you have for founders looking to integrate AI into their marketing efforts?
Our strategies are created at the intersection where customer data meets culture, driven by AI insights and our deep digital expertise.
First, we use AI-powered analytics to dive deep into a brand’s audiences. Understanding your audience is crucial before crafting any strategy.
Next, our tools monitor social post performance, constantly optimising based on real-time insights - sometimes with surprising results!
We also harness AI for social-first content production, maximising our clients' budgets by optimising content we have shot and banked.
As an agency, we use the latest technology to streamline our team’s day-to-day workload so that we can create more time for creativity, allowing us to focus on delivering exceptional work rather than doing admin or manual tasks that can be done faster, and often better, by AI.
Consider automating the routine tasks in your team's workflow with AI tools to elevate your creative output and stay ahead of evolving social trends.
What are your key principles for creating compelling and impactful content that resonates with audiences?
Always start with your audiences. Creating content for a Gen Z audience is very different from creating content for millennial audiences. For example, Gen Z audiences typically consume content frequently and prefer shorter, organic-feeling video content. In contrast, millennials tend to prefer more polished, aspirational, longer-form content to binge, which they consume rather than create.
Develop a series of regular content formats, whether photo or video, that serve a purpose and evoke an emotion in your audiences whilst aligning with your brand objectives. For example, ‘showcase the team and demonstrate the warmer approach your business takes to connect with clients on another level,’ as we have done with our client, prime real estate agency and stars of Netflix’s Buying London, London House.
Achieve this by using strong hooks in your videos to capture attention immediately. Engagement in the first three seconds is crucial for the algorithm. By understanding your audiences, you can also tap into trends and niche communities with specific hashtags.
Aim to inspire both visually and contextually with your content. You don’t need to shoot a movie every week; as long as it feels consistent with your brand (business or personal) and delivers a strong message, it will engage. Utilise platform tools, such as subtitles, to enhance engagement.
How do you measure the success of your social media campaigns, and what metrics should founders focus on?
We keep an eye on engagement rates: views, likes, comments, shares, and saves, as well as follows and any other business goals, such as conversions. It’s key to research the benchmark social media metrics for your industry as a good place to start, or accounts posting similar content.
TikTok has a great ‘top trending’ tool in its studio analytics platform, it tells you which of your videos are engaging the most, we always suggest adding a small boost to those posts to get them out even further and encourage more audience growth.
As well as any real-life feedback, what are people saying in your DMs and when they see you in person?
What are the essential steps for founders to build a strong and authentic brand presence on social media?
Authenticity is the key word, aim to strike a balance of your content feeling real and personable enough to be relatable, but inspiring enough for your audience to keep watching.
Confidence and consistency are always key for growth, the more you post, the more natural it will feel to you and your audience.
Engage with your community. The most successful accounts have a personal connection (or make it feel like it) with their community. Respond to comments, DMs, and engage with your audience through interactive content like polls in stories.
Collaborating with other creators and accounts in your industry or niche is also a great way to reach new fans and clients.
What emerging trends do you see as game-changers for social media marketing, and how should founders prepare for these changes?
I see an increase in the volume of short-form videos posted on social media, with it becoming even easier to create and edit from your phone in most social media apps.
We’ll see higher levels of personalisation across social and our algorithms as AI develops. Because of this, we may even become more private online with more concern for privacy and a rise in ‘dark social’ interactions (anything not visible publicly).
The rise of social commerce (TikTok Shop) will also influence a change in our shopping habits and marketing strategies will need to adapt to this.
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