“Social Media can be a powerful tool to listen to, interact with and gain access to customers that you would otherwise not be able to”
Carol Roth
The statistics related to social media are staggering! Over 3 billion of the 7.6 billion people in the world are active on social media. On average, each person has around 5 social media accounts. 91% of retail brands and 81% of small or medium businesses are using 2 or more social media accounts to interact with consumers. It is no wonder then that social media marketing has completely revolutionized the way products and services are presented to audiences.
One of the more important factors that majority of businesses ignore, however, is the fact that it is not just about being on social media that matters. It relies more upon how well you present yourself. The effectiveness of your marketing strategy makes the difference between winning and losing customers in the world of social media platforms. This is because on social media the audience has the power to be ruthless. Even slight mistakes by major brands can cause their campaigns to be trashed and eventually repealed.
So, how do you make sure that you tick all the right boxes when it comes to social media? Here are a few key elements to consider:
Before you even begin to visualize or implement anything, make sure that you’ve created a sound strategy to base your future plans on. A strategy serves as the foundation for the overall direction that you wish to give your company. It helps define the goals and objectives that the business has to achieve. An effective strategy identifies the business, the need it addresses and how it does that. It also includes an in-depth analysis of the target market, its composition and their preferences.
Start by identifying their needs and requirements. Comments, reviews, question and answering portals etc. are some of the best avenues to search for the most pressing demands that your target market has. Next, understand the type of content that attracts them. Plain text blogs, images, informative videos or maybe entertaining ones.
A mix of these has to work appropriately for a respective target market. The wrong mix can also cause the campaign to crumble.
The market is brimming with competition. The best way to differentiate is to break your target market into niches and target them using personalized products. Make sure that you take a sound basis to create the niches and then target them with efficiency.
If you are planning on doing your own social media posting be sure that you have enough content available to create high quality posts frequently. Daily posting to facebook, and another platform is recommended which means you will need dozens of images, blog articles, reviews or other media over the course of a month.
Failing to continue to post will leave your audience behind people who may have continued to interact with your company or brand can be lost and your competitors will fill the void. If you struggle to come up with new content you may want to look into a professional service who can help you develop additional content or handle additional aspects of your social media strategy. Remember that you need to Be known or Be Alone.
Research reveals that 79% people buy products and services that have been recommended to them by someone they trust. This is where influencer marketing plays its part. Having a person of considerable following in your target market vouch for your brand can increase its credibility to considerable levels.
At the end of the day, there is no turning away from social media. Brands that thought they could avoid it have already embraced it and making healthy returns from it. The secret however, still lies in doing it properly.
Are their individuals in your niche who are currently active in the affiliate space? Do they already promote the brand of a competitor?
