It seems as though the world and their aunt has a social media profile – whether that’s on Facebook, Twitter or TikTok (to name but a few of the platforms available). According to Statista, there are 3.6 billion people in the world who use Social Media[2], so it stands to reason that there must be a few potential customers for your business who use it too. As a result, Social Media Marketing has become a must for almost every business owner over the last decade. Here are our top tips to help Social Media work for you:
Set aside time every week for some planning/scheduling: I can safely say from experience that posting manually (and ‘live’) to different social channels can be a huge time drain. For some, it’s challenging to simply log into Facebook or Twitter and post something without accidentally getting sucked into amusing videos or interesting Twitter threads… If you are one of the many (like me!) who are easily distracted by Social Media, why not consider using a Social Media Scheduling tool (or at least native scheduling on something like Facebook)? Tools like like Hootsuite https://hootsuite.com/en-gb/ and Contentcal https://www.contentcal.io/ can help you to pre-schedule interesting business related content on a range of platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram in advance, helping you make the most of your precious time without losing valuable hours on social media!
Be interesting! Try to mix up the content that you are posting online. If every single post is a sales post about one of your services, chances are people are going to switch off a little. Why not try to combine sales-y posts with interesting news articles that your customers/target audience might find interesting? Try some images and videos too to keep your feed looking interesting and clickable!
Be eye-catching – you can easily brand your images and testimonials in eye-catching templates using a tool like Canva – https://www.canva.com. Be warned though, even the least creative of us can feel like a graphic designer within about 15 minutes! Just don’t let it go to your head and prompt a new business move into graphic design too early…
Keep an eye on the statistics – Whether you are posting to Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn for your business, keep an eye on the native engagement statistics for each platform. What type of content proved to be the most engaging (generating the most clicks, likes, comments and shares)? What time of day works best for your audience? What kind of hashtags prove to be most engaging? If you have access to Google Analytics too for your business website, take a look at the ‘Social Acquisition’ statistics too, as these will tell you how many people are coming from each platform through to your site. It might be that despite your best efforts, some platforms just aren’t working well for you at the moment, suggesting that your time could be better spent elsewhere or that a complete rethink of your social strategy for that platform would be beneficial.
Start conversations and ask questions. If you really want to engage with your potential customers in a positive way, why not try asking questions (on your posts and theirs, if appropriate), and engaging with their responses? This can really help you to start building a relationship with them so that you are top of mind when they think about the products and services that you offer.
So why not schedule an hour or so a week in 2023 for some consistent Social Media Marketing for your small business? It could really help you to raise your profile online with potential customers.
[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users/