After months or even years of debating on whether or not to start your business, you finally decided to go for it. And now that you’ve worked on all the legal, financial, and operational aspects of building a business, you are left with one last question: how to take it to the next level?
Social media is your answer. Or, more specifically, social media is one of the main ways through which you can optimize all aspects of your business: increase sales, grow an audience and community, build your brand’s identity and positioning.
But with so many social media platforms to run, it can quickly become overwhelming, especially if you don’t have any specific knowledge on the best practices and tools to reach your goals.
Solving this dilemma is why we are here. To provide you guidance and assistance on this on-going and sometimes scary journey. So here are 6 tips on how to optimize your use of social media platforms.
Write relevant and original content.
It all starts with content. Content is indeed king. And in a world where people’s attention span has tremendously decreased, the one way to make sure you have consumable content is to make it relevant, original, and high-quality.
Through your blog posts, guest posts, infographics, videos, and pictures, you are creating an image and building your brand positioning. To be deemed worthwhile, your content must, therefore, provide value to every one of your potential customers.
Creating original content is no easy task. Originality is essential when it comes to blog posts and articles. Because thousands of similar articles already exist, created by both the competition and curious minds, it is essential to take the time to write something truly unique to you. This practice will build your credibility and your audience’s trust, as it shows them that you are an expert in your field, that you can think outside of the box and be creative.
If content writing is not your area of expertise, you can always trust your needs to a professional content creator. Their relevant experience will allow them to produce original and valuable content and save you time.
Don’t neglect your email list.
Another thing that is directly related to your website and, therefore, to your business is an email list.
While many people have started doubting the importance of a well-maintained email list in our current world, it is one of the best ways to directly reach out to your (old and new) customers and inform them of your activities.
When customers provide you with their email, whether on your website or even on social media platforms via a direct link, they are pretty much inviting you into their mail. The tricky thing about this is how to stay relevant and valuable because people can easily unsubscribe if your emails are no longer of use to them.
By segmenting your email list into groups with similar interests, you’ll be able to more easily connect with each reader and ensure that everything you send them is important.
Consider using Hootsuite
It is not easy to personally manage several social media accounts. Luckily, there are platforms such as Hootsuite that can make things run more smoothly.
Hootsuite is a social media management platform that allows you to create, schedule, and modify your content. It also gives you the ability to directly engage with your customers without signing in to each social account individually. You can also create lists of potential customers, design future campaigns, track on-going ones, follow your competition’s activities, etc.
With just the free version, you can add three social media pages and start managing your business with more ease.
Hootsuite helps you see the bigger picture of your social media marketing plan and analyze the overall engagement and reactions your content is receiving. With it, you will stay ahead of your posting schedule and optimize your use of social media platforms.
Focus on engagement
Measure your engagement in terms of likes, shares, comments, and all other forms of interaction with your content.
On social media platforms, this is the key to building a community with your audience. Through the exchanges that you have, you can build deep and long-lasting relationships with them.
Focusing on engagement means responding to comments and messages and being present when needed. By paying attention to your engagement analytics, you will also have important data regarding which posts perform well and why they did.
That information will guide you for future content creation, as you will know what type of content to focus the most on.
Partner with micro and nano influencers
Influencers are everywhere. In real life and the virtual world as well. On social media platforms, these are the people who are known to do product placement and advertising.
But it all depends on your budget, as the more followers an influencer has, the more expensive their fees will most likely be. Luckily, you don’t have to reach out to influencers with millions of followers to promote your product and services. Start local and small.
For small businesses, micro and nano influencers are the go-to options. Although they have fewer followers than macro-influencers, they can still provide you with more exposure. Nano-influencers’ number of followers often range between 1000-10000, while micro-influencers’ following is usually between 10,000 and 50,0000 people.
Ultimately, it all comes down to finding the right influencer for your business industry and social media marketing needs.
Make use of Instagram stories and highlights.
If you were still wondering whether or not to create a business profile on Instagram, think of the fact that it has over 1 billion active monthly users. And although not all of these people are your target audience, there is a great chance that those who are logging in every day and spending hours scrolling through people’s feeds and stories.
Having an Instagram account will help you show a different side of your business, as stories, pictures, and videos, are what thrives the most on that platform.
Highlights are another commonly neglected feature of Instagram. Although not many businesses optimize their use of it, highlights can, in fact, provide customers with much-needed information and resources.
By creating a highlight for each product or service category you offer, adding FAQs and customer testimonials, you’ll be helping your customers learn more about your business and what it has to offer.
Summary
From conducting your market research to defining your marketing strategy and building your social media presence and brand awareness, various things come into play regarding marketing and social media optimization. With so many platforms, rules, and practices to keep in mind, social media marketing can seem quite overwhelming at first. But in reality, all it takes is patience, skill, and a genuine desire to learn how each relevant platform works.
However, when you don’t know where to start or don’t have enough time or resources to spend on training, you can always trust your needs to digital marketing agencies in your town. By contacting a company that provides small businesses with social media marketing in Denver, CO, you can then focus on your area of expertise and on what you’re genuinely passionate about.
