Exploring the World of Social Media Marketing

Social media has drastically evolved over the past few years. It has gone from a place where young people would gather in order to exchange ideas and interact with their peers to becoming a powerful tool for marketing and business. Like all tools, social media must be used in an effective way. Many businesses are still making the mistake of viewing social media as nothing more than a way to share photographs of cute kittens. For this reason, they have not integrated social media into their marketing strategy. This is a common mistake amongst small business owners. When social media marketing is done correctly, it is a way to participate in the online discourse about your business, it is a way to appeal to a mass audience.

In the same way that businesses will first make a plan for traditional advertising, business owners must also make a plan prior to marketing on social media. Many of the elements of traditional marketing hold true in social media marketing. Branding oneself, identifying a brand's strengths and weaknesses, and then maximizing the strengths and minimizing weaknesses is all part of developing a good social media plan.

Designate a Manager for Social Media Marketing

Running a business requires the business owner to wear a lot of hats. They are constantly busy. As a result of this, many do not have time to personally oversee social media marketing. It is essential that a social media manager is designated.

In order to be successful, social media marketing requires that an individual, or a group of individuals, is constantly interacting with the public. This means that a social media manager would be responsible for not only posting content on social media sites, but also quickly responding to content that is posted. The social media manager and their staff should be monitoring social media accounts 24 hours a day seven days a week. This can be done via email alerts or by using mobile applications.

Brand Yourself

When clients or customers visit your social media page, they are going to want to feel like the page reflects the same style and feel of your business. Social media pages should reflect your brand. In order to do this appropriately, the first step a business owner would take is determining what social media sites they are going to use. The usual standbys like Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus are great for small business owners. Depending on the niche market of your business, sites like LinkedIn and Pinterest might also be appropriate.

A good social media page is going to include color photos of your product or your services. Small business owners will want to include their profile picture. A direct call to action will let customers or clients know what you want them to do. And finally, clear and concise contact information will let customers know how to get a hold of you.

Don’t Leave Things to Chance

As we mentioned at the outset, in order for social media marketing to be effective, the strategy must be well thought out and planned. This means making a calendar of events. This calendar may include a specified number of posts that your business will make every week. It will also include the times that you will post. Prior to posting the content, each post should have already been discussed and prepared. At times, businesses will start out gung-ho for their social media projects only to lose interest in it over time. Planning things out months in advance prevents this from happening.

Keep Your Customer's Attention

When your customers are visiting your social media page, there are a lot of other things vying for their attention. If the content that you generate is not engaging, you will quickly lose your customer's attention. As you are posting content, put yourself in your customer's shoes. Ask yourself, if I was a customer, what would I want to get out of this experience? Good content is engaging. It may include tips, advice, social media only offers, contests, how-to videos and more.

Once you have developed a good social media marketing strategy, follow it up. When a customer post problems or complaints, address them immediately. Learn to turn bad situations like customer complaints into a positive thing.

Many small businesses shy away from using social media marketing. By doing this, they are handicapping themselves. Social media is the marketing force of the day and will no doubt be with us for some time. It is a useful tool that will complement any small businesses marketing strategy.