Every business needs a solid and competitive marketing strategy to stay ahead of the competition. Companies have the liberty to choose from several marketing gimmicks, but none beat the influence social media has today. Social media platforms have become unimaginably powerful. Nine out of ten marketers attest that social media has single-handedly taken over the marketing world.
Hence, prioritizing social media in your business’s marketing plan is crucial. After all, it has the power to take your marketing game to new heights. However, for social media to show its actual effect, you need to strategize and follow a plan.
Read ahead to find out how you can use social media to improve your marketing strategy.
Table of Contents
1. Use social media to improve your SEO
Just like social media, SEO is an essential marketing tool to increase your company’s website visibility. But is there any link between SEO and social media? Many marketers consider SEO and social media as two entirely different marketing approaches. They claim that there is no apparent link between the two. However, in reality, your social media profiles can have a significant impact on your SEO.
When you add links to your social media account’s descriptions and captions, it increases your site visits considerably. Linking your site on your social media profile is a proven and effective backlink strategy. Social media also allows you to share valuable content you post on your site, helping potential customers discover your business.
2. Plan for every channel individually
Social media platforms include Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat, Pinterest, Tumblr, etc. While all of them are part of ‘social media,’ they all work on entirely different algorithms. Therefore, you must strategize each of your social media profiles individually and carefully. However, you don’t have to create a page on each website. You can pick only one or two. But, the more, the merrier.
- Facebook is the largest platform amongst all. With more than 2 billion users, it provides excellent and affordable paid promotion offers and free-of-cost link building.
- Instagram is similar to Facebook, excluding some features. You can quickly and conveniently run paid promotions that reach hundreds and thousands of customers.
- Pinterest is a photo-sharing platform where you can share visual graphics of your product and service. It is a great tactic to attract sales.
- Snapchat is the fastest growing social media platform. It is best for paid promotions, exclusive access, personalized content, and driving brand recognition.
3. Establish a goal
Social media can do wonders for your business if used the right way. It can improve customer engagements, increase your customer base, spike up your sales, and perform customer service. It also allows one-on-one virtual interaction with customers and helps gain valuable feedback.
However, to achieve all these measures, it is vital to set a goal. It will give you the right motivation to work towards improving your social media presence. Plans could include target sales, a specific target audience, or even some number of followers. Having a goal in mind is what will drive you to post creative content regularly.
4. Be vigilant to customer feedback
Do you know how one negative tweet can hurt your business profile? Experts suggest that a single negative review convinces almost 35% of people not to purchase from the company. Hence, if there is one thing you want to steer clear of, it is any negative feedback.
Use your social media accounts to get regular feedback from your customers. The process is direct, simple, and instant. In case you get any negative remark, you can immediately apologize to the customer and work on your product or service. If you deliver a very thoughtful and timely response to your customers, they will feel admired and respected. On the other hand, if you take forever to respond or don’t respond to queries, customers might switch to your competitors. It is something that can prove exceptionally bad for your business.
5. Keep your audience engaged
As mentioned above, staying active is key to ace your social media marketing strategy. For your profiles to get at least a decent level of engagement, you need to find a way to keep your audience engaged.
There are various ways you can interact with your audience, including posting polls, replying to customers in the comments section, and dealing with their queries through messages, etc. Sharing user-generated information and participating in the conversation is a great way to connect with your audience. Furthermore, conducting live sessions on Instagram or Facebook is an excellent way to increase interaction with your audience. Live stories give you a chance to get back to customer queries instantly. It helps secure and build customer relationships.
6. Come up with creative social content
The most crucial tip for social media marketing is to post relevant content consistently. You will fail to get enough engagement if you post content which your audience finds uninteresting. Several tactics can help you come up with exciting and interactive content for your social media accounts.
The first one is posting short videos. Video posts receive nearly 38% more engagement than pictures. Videos are also a great way of sending a message across, which weren’t possible to communicate in a written text format. Sticking to one theme is also vital for attracting a significant number of followers. However, it is best to keep all the visual elements such as filters, fonts, sizing, etc., consistent in each post to gain brand recognition. Undoubtedly, it is a superb way to secure brand loyalty.
Posting about social causes shows a more human side of your brand. It also enhances your brand’s philosophy and ethics. People are becoming increasingly aware and conscious about every little social problem rising from racism to chauvinism. Therefore, you must show your company’s good side by supporting and posting about social causes and engaging in social events.
Conclusion
Given the rate of technological developments, one may only predict more advanced and evolved social media platforms in the future. Therefore, it is best to prioritize and invest your money and time in strategizing the use of your social media business profiles.
Approaching your social media strategy with careful consideration is critical to your business’s success. The outcome social media marketing can bring is exceptional and better than all other marketing strategies combined.