Social Media
Today, most people walk around with the world at their fingertips. With a smart phone or similar device at the ready, everyone is just a few clicks away from connecting with a friend, searching for an answer, or making their next purchase. And increasingly often, those actions are in some way related to social media.
For brands in today’s crowded virtual landscape, thoughtful constructive use of social media plays a critical role in rising above the noise. In fact, since 80% of customers engage with brands on social media, not participating – or not devoting the time and care into developing a shrewd social media strategy – just doesn’t make business sense.
Let’s take a deeper look at how social media influences your brand to ensure that in a world that’s always connected, you’re connecting with your customers.
What is Social Media?
“We don’t have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well we do it.”
— Erik Qualman
At its core, social media marketing is the process of creating, scheduling, and publishing content – text, photos, video, audio, infographics and more – across engagement channels such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram to promote offerings, increase awareness and drive conversions. When deployed effectively, social media allows the opportunity to tailor content for distinct audiences, engage with existing and potential users, and identify opportunities for increased reach and engagement.
In today’s digital era, social media has become an integral part of everyday life. From connecting with friends and family to promoting businesses and brands, social media platforms offer unparalleled opportunities for communication and engagement. And, because more than 75% of the world’s population aged 13+ uses social media, it’s an essential component of any marketing mix.
The Impact of Creative Services
“We live in a time that we get to use social media as a tool.”
— Gigi Hadid
Social media is embedded into the fabric of everyday life. And that’s not likely to change anytime soon. In fact, if anything it will only grow. Every single second, 5.5 new users engage with social media – which means dozens more of your potential customers have hopped on board in the time it took you to read this sentence. It’s important for you to be on social media simply because so much of the population is. Skipping out means you’re not only conspicuous in your absence, you’re also missing out on countless customers and promotional opportunities.
Here are six reasons social media is critical to advancing your brand…
Increases awareness
An active social media presence can work wonders in making your brand more prominent and recognizable. Regular, visually appealing content catches the attention of both current and potential customers and provides an opportunity to showcase your brand’s offerings and personality. By simply raising your profile, you expose your brand to more people, thereby gaining more conversions.
Reemphasizes your messaging and offerings
In social media, you control the message. You have the chance to address your customer’s issue, explain how you can resolve it, and reinforce why they should choose your brand. It’s the ultimate opportunity to reinforce your marketing message at every stage of the buying cycle.
Leverages other elements of your marketing mix
Social media provides an outstanding outlet to further emphasize your other marketing mix assets – and take them to the next level. A prominent billboard campaign, for example, can provide a visual callback on social media, along with provide additional information too detailed to include for passers-by. Similarly, earned media can be shared via social media to add another layer of recognition.
Is immediate and flexible
A social media post can reach thousands of people in minutes… and grow from there. A message with more immediate implications can be shared and spread much faster than traditional media outlets. It happens in real time and is shared with a large group. What’s more, should your message change, social platforms are often nimbler in allowing for edits – or at least in allowing you to share a new message in a timely way.
Builds an engaged community
Social media allows for a deeper, two-way connection that is difficult to achieve via other means. Through comments and direct messaging, you can gain real, valuable insight into what your customers think, want, and need. You can also discern trends and collect feedback through scanning comments and reviews. Engaging with your customer base gives you unprecedented insight into their perceptions and preferences, which, in turn, allows you to tailor your marketing and adapt your strategies accordingly. What’s more, the connection forged through the two-way interaction afforded by social media can drastically improve customer loyalty, increase customer satisfaction, and amplify word-of-mouth marketing.
What Social Media is best for my brand?
“Every time you post…you are contributing to your own digital footprint and personal brand.”
— Amy Jo Martin
If you have a solid marketing plan, you likely have the framework that will dictate what social media platforms are best for your brand. Delving into your objectives and target audiences and then evaluating those against the metrics of various social media outlets can help you discern what may be your best fit.
The social media landscape is ever changing – which brings along with it challenges and opportunity. Regular evaluation of both your goals and the available social media outlets can help ensure you’re making the most of the latest opportunities.
How do I develop a Social Media strategy?
“Social media is just a buzzword until you come up with a plan.”
— Felicia Lin
A good social strategy requires more than just posting a photo of your weekly special to Instagram, sharing an album of photos from your business evens, or talking about how great your products and services are.
A robust strategy ensures consistency, relevance, and value in your social media posts. Determining the types of content you will create – such as articles, images, videos, or infographics – and establishing a content calendar to plan and schedule your posts will help maintain a balanced and effective mix of promotional, educational, and entertaining content.
Without a clear content strategy, a defined business goal, and key performance indicators, your activity is unlikely to move the needle on enhancing your business. If you don’t have the time to analyze the data from all of your efforts, identify areas that give results, and adjust your strategy to take advantage of online trends and changing scenarios, outsourcing your social media efforts might make the most sense for you.
Take your marketing to the next level.
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