Social media: Some love it, some hate it. But the fact is, it’s here to stay.
10 years ago, those two words barely meant anything. Now, 1.96 billion people use social media. Social media networks are a force to be reckoned with. You can’t ignore the fact that most people are using social networks to connect with other people and discover new products and services.
Now is the time to take advantage of the new era of social media.
If you want to branch out to social media as a company, check out this article where we outline the basics of creating successful social marketing campaigns.
Successful Social Marketing Campaigns Know Their Audience
It’s important to know your audience so you can produce relevant content that your followers will appreciate.
If you are a dog grooming business, your target audience would be dog owners. If you are a bike repair shop, your target audience is most likely active bikers. While a few of the bikers might own dogs and a few of the dog owners might own bikes, you cannot assume that each of these businesses would have the same patrons and therefore they have different audiences with different interests and behaviors.
Aren’t sure who your target audience is? Don’t be afraid to ask. Post a questionnaire on your website or social media and get to know your customers. Some questions you can ask include:
- Age and gender
- What their interests are
- What they are looking for in your product
When you get to know who your social marketing campaign is for, you can provide precise and relevant content that is more likely to get your customers to engage.
Post Regularly
There is no secret formula to how often you should post on your social marketing profiles, but posting regularly will help your audience know what to expect while also keeping your business and brand in front of them.
There’s no question that consistency in your business plan will produce results. Set goals to post often, but also be realistic. You’ll want to make sure you are providing good content every time you present something new to your followers and it’s never worth posting meaningless content just for the sake of posting.
Posting a quality article every day may be manageable at first, but eventually, it will get harder and harder to keep it up.
Need help producing quality content? You can always outsource some of the topics to keep things interesting and fresh.
Track Your Results
One of the great things about social marketing campaigns is they are pretty easy to track.
Networks like Facebook and Instagram will break your campaigns down to interactions, likes, and clicks. You can see exactly how many new followers and interactions you get from pushing certain content.
With these results, you will be able to know exactly what works for your audience and what doesn’t.
Use these metrics to tweak your campaigns to be more effective by moving away from content topics and types that don’t get results.
Engage With Your Audience
Consumers are more likely to engage with a company on social media than through customer service.
When you read through the comments you will know exactly what people are saying about your business.
Don’t be afraid to interact. Let your audience get to know the person behind the product. Give your brand a personality on social media; be funny, informative, helpful or a combination of all three.
Also, don’t be afraid to get personal. Your followers want to know where you are from and how you got where you are now. What struggles did you overcome to get your business up and running? Create a story about yourself and your brand.
Now Start Posting
Contact us so we can help put your business out there. Social marketing campaigns are more relevant today than ever before. And considering how many Facebook users there are, it’s not going anywhere soon.