All digital marketers will tell you that social media is one of the most powerful tools in a business’s marketing arsenal, but it is also one of the most underused and underestimated. For those just starting out in social media marketing, it can be daunting to figure out how to take the first steps into the vast worlds of Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Getting started on social media doesn’t have to be intimidating or costly. Here are 5 simple tips that can be easily incorporated to your larger marketing strategy and are sure to help you connect with new and existing audiences on social media, boost your brand awareness and increase your sales.
Understand your Platforms
Before you choose which platforms to post to, you should do your homework and look into each social media platform to figure out whether it will be worth using each one. For each social platform, you should identify the type of user (creating a buyer persona for each one can be helpful), what posts get the best engagement and most importantly, if there is a following for your niche. From there, you can make an informed decision on whether this platform will help you reach your target market and contribute to the goals you’ve set.
By understanding the platforms you choose to post on, you can make sure you are maximising each one rather than posting for the sake of posting. In many cases, you are better off being totally absent from a platform than having a poor or inconsistent presence.
Set Goals
As we’ve already mentioned, your social media strategy should always support a larger strategy. Many small or new businesses think they need to be on social media because they’ve seen their competitors do the same thing successfully. The main thing to remember is if you start using social media without a clear understanding of your business goals, you run the risk of achieving very little valuable return.
So where do you start with setting goals? Ask yourself what you want to get out of social media. Do you want to increase brand awareness? Are you looking to increase clicks to your website? Maybe you want to improve revenue? Once you’ve answered these, you’re on the right track to setting some effective goals. Whatever you decide, ensure you make your goals measurable. Identify what KPIs can be set in order to reach them. In many cases, social media campaigns fail because the goals are either not realistic or measurable, which leads to a lack of valuable leads or results.
Post Consistently
Consistency is the key to cracking social media. This counts in your tone of voice, the use of hashtags (if you choose to use them), branding and the times that you post.
The main way to ensure consistency is having a social media calendar and scheduling tool (we use SEMRush). This is a great way to see all your planned content at a glance so you can ensure the tone of voice is consistent throughout. To help, it could also be an idea to have one person who handles the creation of your posts. You can also create a posting schedule so you know posts will be going out around the same time each day. If you have an engaged following, they will come to expect posts around these times each day.
Share Visuals
Statistics show that posts with visuals get better engagement and are more popular with audiences. Aim to share visuals as much as possible, whether it’s in the form of an infographic, a video or even a silly GIF. In particular, Instagram and Pinterest are visual-first platforms and if your visual content isn’t engaging or eye-catching, users are unlikely to stop scrolling.
With Twitter being so fast-moving, you only have a few seconds to grab users’ attention before they scroll off into the vast sea of tweets and lose your text-based tweet forever. The simplest way to enhance a tweet is to add an image. If you are a service-based business, it can be more difficult to find engaging images, so why not showcase your team with photos from the office? Maybe you could create short videos or share stock photos.
Our favourite site for stock photos is Adobe Stock and make sure to check out Giphy for a endless stream of GIFs.
The team at Colewood are experts in creating effective social media strategies to help a range of businesses reach their desired audience. For more information about our social media services, visit our website or contact our team.
