Social media marketing is using social media platforms to connect with your audience to build your brand, increase sales and drive website traffic. This means publishing awesome content on your social media profiles, listening to your followers and engaging them, analyzing your results, and running ads on social media.
With social media marketing becoming an integral part of the business strategy today, social media platforms are emerging with new features that are beneficial to social media marketers.
For new entrepreneurs and small businesses who are in the early stages of using social media marketing, it’s important to understand what social media marketing is really about. It’s not about blogging or emailing links about new products or coupons but a form of Internet-based marketing that uses social networks to promote brands and impact consumers.
In the article below, we offer you a practical guide for small businesses who want to get started with their social media marketing strategy and improve their knowledge in this field.
Growth Tools
Even if you’re just getting started with the whole social media marketing aspect of your small business, you’ve probably heard that today Instagram is the number one go-to social media platform for businesses of all sizes. So, you should put your focus on Instagram and create engaging content for your target audience daily and find ways to grow your account. However, this can be time-consuming and tiring.
As you must create interesting content, design compelling Stories, and keep an eye on your competition, you might not have spare time to grow your audience. And this is where growth tools enter the picture, but you must be careful when signing up for one. For example, a lot of businesses that use automation tools like Nitreo ended up being banned from the platform. That is why you need to look for an alternative that will help you grow your account organically and safely.
Choose Your Social Network Platforms
One of the first steps in social media marketing that small businesses should make is to define what it means to them and which social networking platforms best suit their brand and business needs. There are several ways to take advantage of social media, from creating hashtag campaigns and launching news to posting offers and organizing contests.
Before you create a profile for your company on social media, you should find out what the different platforms offer and then choose the one that best suits your company. A lot of visual content is suitable for platforms such as Instagram and Pinterest, for example, while links to blog posts are suitable for sharing on Twitter or LinkedIn. If you’re interested in creating video content, then you should check out TikTok and YouTube.
In the long run, however, you should try and use more channels. But more channels require both more time invested as well as a larger marketing budget. In addition, it can take a long time to get followers regardless of the channel you focus on so make sure to have a good marketing strategy in place.
Prioritize Good Customer Service
In the digital age, news spreads fast and before you know it, you have gained a reputation for having either poor or fantastic customer service. You attract more customers if you have a reputation for having good customer service and that it gives a positive image of your brand.
If you take hours or days to respond to your customers on social media, customers will undoubtedly end up being dissatisfied with your services. So, make sure to provide every customer with a fast, polite, sincere, and informative answer. Try to respond within 48 hours, and let them know that this is the time frame when they can expect a reply.
Stay Active
Social media marketing should be your top priority when it comes to digital marketing. It’s a great way to increase your company’s online visibility, get more traffic and build strong relationships with current and potential customers without investing much.
Social media requires time and commitment. An inactive account with old information or unanswered questions and comments gives a negative impression that can damage your brand. It’s preferable to manage a single channel efficiently than to attempt to be noticed everywhere and fail.
Final Thoughts
If your goal is to elevate your marketing strategy and reach new heights of business success, then social media can be the best tool for your small business. You can achieve great wonders if you create valuable content and experiment with the different features that various social media platforms offer. If you maintain consistency and quality, soon enough you will connect with your ideal customers and witness wonderful results.
