Over the past decade, social media has become one of the most important parts of modern culture.
It is where we connect with others, share images and stories and has even become the way many of us present ourselves to the world.
This applies not only to the general public but to marketers too.
If you are like most small businesses on social media, you use various social platforms to:
- Build and promote brand awareness
- Connect with customers and potential customers
- Drive traffic to your website
Many small businesses out there have yet to capitalize on the benefits that social media can offer.
In fact, only 52 percent of small businesses are thought to use digital platforms as part of their marketing strategy.
By becoming one of those businesses that do, you can more easily interact with current customers and also drive new potential customers to your page or website.
The reach of social media is worldwide and is a great way to save money or more expensive forms of advertising.
Follow the tips below to launch a social media marketing campaign that will generate explosive growth for your small business.
While it is helpful to have a consistent presence across all social channels, it is important not to spread yourself too thin. Particularly as a small business with limited resources.
Choose one or two channels to really focus your efforts on and build a loyal following.
When choosing where to exert most of your efforts in relation to social media marketing, you should know who your audience is.
This will help you choose the platform that is most likely to target that particular demographic.
For example, the latest data shows that 34 percent of Twitter users are female and 66 percent are male.
If you are a small business targeting your products and services towards women, you may wish to choose a different platform to exert your main efforts.
Likewise, if you are a small business that sells products or services to teenagers. You would have more success choosing a platform like Snapchat, which has a teenage engagement rate of 63 percent.
Be sure to really consider your brand and also the industry that your small business operates within. Which channels are your competitors using?
What are their success rates on those channels?
If you are already set up on multiple channels but unsure where to focus your best efforts or even paid advertisements, analyze the traffic that you already have to your website.
If most of your click-throughs come from Facebook, this could be a good space to focus your efforts.
2. Figure out what content resonates best
This will depend on your audience and the kind of content that appeals to them most. Figure this out by doing extensive market research. Study the social media channels of your competitors.
Ask questions such as, when do they post? What are they posting? What voice do they use?
What kind of engagements to each style of content appears to have?
Even better if you have an existing customer base that you can question on this.
Offer an incentive such as a voucher for answering questions on what kinds of content appeal to them most.
Figuring out the kind of content you will be producing is also important when choosing the platform that you are hoping to exert most of your efforts on.
If your content is highly-visual then Instagram or Pinterest might be the ideal place.
On the other hand, if your content comes mainly in the form of long-form articles, a space such as Twitter might be more ideal.
3. Define your goals
Social media marketing has the power to generate a number of leads for your business.
But before you move forward with a strategy, be sure to figure out exactly what you want from your online campaign.
Ask yourself what you expect from participating in social media marketing. Is the main goal to increase brand awareness?
To drive sales? To build a community?
The better you understand the intentions of your business, the more success you will have when implementing those goals.
4. Stay organized
When managing multiple social media channels, it can be difficult to stay on top of things.
Be sure to come up with a watertight social media strategy and build spreadsheets detailing the success and failures of posted content.
Adding a social media dashboard is a great way to keep all of your different channels in one place.
It is an effective solution to managing your social media accounts and dashboards like Buffer can even be used to upload content at specific times.
This means you don’t need to be sat at a computer all day, waiting for the best time to upload.
It’s not only reaching out to potential customers that can be beneficial.
Using social media platforms to connect with like-minded business professionals is also paramount to successful strategizing on social channels.
Professional networking is extremely important to the success of your business.
Good connections with other brands, businesses and influencers can lead to brand partnerships, business leads and will help you identify trends in your niche and figure out best practices.
6. Create great content – and reuse it
Of course, the whole point of social media is to buy seconds of your audiences time by keeping them entertained.
This means that one of the most effective ways to have a social media presence that wins is to create engaging, shareable content.
Establish a content creation process. Figure out what media works best for your audience – and don’t forget about videos.
Statistics show that a phenomenal 1200 percent more shares are generated by videos on social media than by text and images combined.
When you have effective evergreen content that has had high engagement rates, don’t be afraid to use it again.
When creating content remember to keep the message simple and tell a story. Your audience should be given a reason to connect with it and want to share.
Appeal to the emotions of your audience. Make them laugh, make them stop and think or simply just show them a beautiful image that really has the wow-factor. Instilling emotions in your followers is the best way to draw in their attention.
To summarise, implementing an effective social media marketing strategy all comes down to choosing the best platforms and content for you and developing a great strategy.
Pay attention to your competitors, organize yourself and create content that moves people.
If you follow the above, we are sure your small business is well on the way to generating explosive growth.
