The world of digital marketing is growing at a rapid rate and social media is key in connecting with your consumers. If your target market is on social media, why aren’t you?
Consumers expect to see their favorite brands and businesses utilizing the platforms they enjoy. So, if you aren’t on social media, it’s time to build your profiles. If you are on social media, are you utilizing your platforms in the best possible way?
Social media companies in Sonoma County and the surrounding areas can help you maximize your reach on different platforms. Read on as we discuss several checks you can perform to see if you’re taking full advantage of social media.
Which Platforms Do I Use?
When beginning to build your social media presence, you’ll need to figure out where your target audience is. Which platforms are going to be best in reaching your consumers? Each platform varies in their purpose for the business and consumer. Understanding each platform and how they can help your business is key.
If you’re B2B (business-to-business), your starting point may be different than if you’re B2C (business-to-consumer). There are so many different social media platforms that exist and each platform serves a different purpose.
• Facebook: This social media platform is all about community and connecting with friends and family. On Facebook, you can connect with your audience and open up lines of communication in an easy fashion. Facebook focuses on B2B and B2C interactions, and provides an area for consumers to interact directly with your brand.
• Instagram: This platform is based all around images and videos. You are able to interact with you consumers in a fun, engaging manner. There are so many great features on this social media platform. For example, stories allow your followers the ability to share their favorite posts from your business to their own followers. This is a great way for others to get acquainted with your business. Similar to Facebook, Instagram focuses on B2B and B2C interactions.
• LinkedIn: This social media platform is all about the professional side of your business. Focusing largely on B2B, it’s a great place for networking. LinkedIn is the best platform to find new employees and for those seeking jobs to find out if your company is the right fit for them.
• YouTube: This platform focuses on sharing videos with your consumers. Videos are a great way to show what your business’s services or products offer to the consumer. YouTube is for both B2B and B2C markets. Utilizing the ads that play before videos is a great way to reach consumers with your brand on videos they enjoy watching.
• Twitter: This platform is the “spur of the moment” thought where you can post a quick Tweet in 280 characters or less. Twitter focuses on B2B because it’s one of the best ways to have direct interaction between a business and their consumer. Twitter can also be a great platform for customer service needs, which can translate into more B2C interactions.
• TikTok: One of the newer social media platforms is TikTok. You use this platform to create fun, engaging, informational videos to show your followers. Using TikTok is all about staying on top of trends while understanding how to keep your content educational for your consumers.
Have a Clear Strategy
Once you’ve decided on which platforms to utilize, you’ll want to develop a clear understanding on what you’d like to achieve from social media. Having clear, defined objectives and goals will help you better understand the type of content you need to generate.
Creating Your Content
After creating your platforms and strategy, you’re ready to start creating content and posting on your platforms. Each social media platform is different, and therefore you should have a clear understanding of the different tone of voices you should be using on each platform. Being fun, friendly, and trendy on Instagram wouldn’t work for a more professional platform such as LinkedIn.
Engagement
It’s more than just posting on your platforms every once in a while and leaving it at that. Your followers use social media to interact with your brand and business. If you aren’t engaging by replying to DM’s (direct messages) or replying to comments on your pictures, you’ll lose the trust of your followers.
Some of your consumers will follow your business with the sole purpose of wanting to see your products and services represented on social media and to show their support. Other followers go to social media knowing it’s a quick and easy method to ask customer service questions. These followers will expect a response in a timely manner and, if you’re not following up, you may lose their trust and their business.
Going beyond simply interacting with your followers, social media is a great place to see what your competition is doing. Looking out for what your competition is doing on social media is not only a great way to come up with new ideas for your own platforms, but a great technique in finding what they aren’t doing. Staying ahead of your competition is key and can give you a competitive advantage, especially in a competitive environment such as social media.
Reporting
So, you’ve set up your platforms, and you’re posting, but how can you tell if you’re making moves in the social media world? Look at your insights! It’s easy to see notifications popping up on your screen letting you know someone new followed you or someone “liked” your picture. Most social media platforms have some type of analytics that will let you see a select time period of how your business is doing in real time.
Building your social media is a daunting and time-consuming task. An experienced Social Media Coordinator can take the weight off your shoulders and take your platforms to the next level.
Still not sure where to start? Our team of experienced digital marketers can help! WSI Smart Marketing is proud to offer Social Media Management to companies in Sonoma County. To discuss all your social media marketing and management needs, please call us at (707) 843-3714.
