Small Business Brief

Marketing

How To Use Social Media as an Avenue to Market Your Business


During the 90s, we saw the internet pour into every home. Emails and popup ads illuminated our eyes and the world of marketing was forever changed.

Little by little, the gatekeepers of big commercial ads have fallen away. This has allowed businesses to get closer to their customers.

A good thing about social media is that it continues to drive businesses a step forward. It gives small entrepreneurs a chance to succeed in a major way.

In 2019, businesses big and small can’t afford to miss out on social media marketing.

Keep reading to discover how to use it to market your business.

Start With a Plan

Before you start planning your social media strategy, do your research. You should understand how people are interacting on the platforms. Don’t wait until it’s time to launch your products to open a page. Grab your social handle and do some competitor stalking.

What is the purpose of your social media?

Your plan should consist of the goal you want to accomplish and how you’re going to accomplish it. Start with a problem you have and work backward. You can use social media to drive local business, increase sales, increase brand awareness, better understand an industry, and more.

With this information fresh in your brain, start creating targeted content. If you started with a solid plan and it fell off the rails, read more here.

Create Content Worth Clicking

Content worth clicking on is content that your target audience cares to engage with. Empty-nesters are going to engage with social media in a different way than college freshmen. Therefore, you have to be aware of what these audiences are looking for. Likewise, a business owner is going to function in a different arena than others.

In 2019, optimizing content for voice search and creating video are in high demand.

The type of content your provide depends on the platform. For example, content on Instagram is better in high-quality. On Youtube, people are a bit more forgiving.

To find things people care about, you’ll need to know where your audience is interacting. You can use tools like Google Trends, Ubersuggest, and Reddit to find out what people are talking about.

Use Influencers

Influencers leverage the power of word-of-mouth with their large social media presence. People trust social media personalities that they’ve invested time into. By using an influencer, you gain access to an audience in a way you couldn’t before.

Beauty gurus and tech geeks are probably the most visible influencers but they exist everywhere. An influencer can be a respected business blogger. Establish relationships with them by engaging with their content on a regular basis if possible.

This way, they will be more receptive to promoting your product or services.

Measure Your Efforts

Organic reach dwindles as more people join platforms. Measuring your efforts by ‘follows’ isn’t enough anymore. You need to be able to tell what is working and what isn’t.

Popular ways to measure are:

  • social engagement such as likes and comments
  • email signups
  • video views and view lengths
  • clicks on your website content
  • hashtag performance

The Good Thing About Social Media?

The good thing about social media is that it’s scalable. You can start small and grow to reach billions. What’s more, it’s possible to do this for little to no cost.

The state of the internet and social media is constantly changing. Understanding your target market and their changing tastes is key to staying ahead of market trends. Moving quickly on your ideas will help you to refine your strategy as you go.

For more creative ways to boost brand reach, click here.



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