Social media marketing is one of the most effective, free marketing solutions available to your business, but that doesn’t mean it’s a straight shot to success. If you’ve noticed that your social media campaign isn’t giving you the kind of returns that you want, you may be falling into some common errors.
The great thing about social media is that it is extremely fast-paced, so yesterday’s marketing mistakes can stay in the past. Each day is a new opportunity to tweak your campaign to help you achieve your business goals.
Think of the Customer
Without your customers, your company literally wouldn’t exist, so doesn’t it make sense to think of them – and not necessarily your bottom line – first? Gone are the days when social media was considered a fluffy or secondary means of advertising. You need to be purposeful with every single thing that you post in your social media campaign.
Quality Content
I could devote an entire book to the importance of writing quality content, but this little blurb will have to do for now. Your content needs to be hearty and polished. Sure, you probably won’t lose very many customers based on your incorrect use of their/they’re/there, but you won’t be doing yourself any favors, either.
(Pixabay / Foundry)
If you don’t have a second set of eyes to look over your posts before you publish, at least run them through a free or paid version of an online grammar checker like Grammarly (referral link). These posts influence your reputation as an authority in your field, and your grammar should reflect your attention to detail.
Additionally, what you write should have substance. People know fluff when they read it, so don’t post something just to post something. Make sure that what you’re creating has value to your audience; otherwise, it is better if you don’t post anything at all.
Focus on Educating
When you post things to social media, your purpose should be to educate your customers. It may feel a little counter-intuitive to not be touting your merchandise all the time, but it’s a strategy that will go a long way.
Your goal is to build trust. Your customers want to feel like you have their best interest in mind, so you need to post things that make their lives a little easier. Consider posting answers to Frequently Asked Questions and detailed tutorials for things they can do themselves, or give a virtual, behind-the-scenes tour of your manufacturing facility.
Show Solutions to Your Customer’s Needs
When someone hooses to follow your company on social media, it shows the world that they are interested in what you have to offer. That’s some pretty important free advertising for you, so you need to give a little bit back in return.
Anticipate your customer’s needs and post relevant information that will help them solve their problems. The more helpful you are, the more often they’re likely to return, share, retweet, or like your posts.
Call-to-Action
Studies show that people like to be told what to do after they have a positive experience with a business, so make sure that you have a calculated call-to-action within each post. Remind them to like, share, retweet, or subscribe to information that they appreciate, or to click for more information.
Start with your titles
Post titles are the flashing strobe lights that will direct your traffic where you want it to go, so you need to make sure that your post titles are worthy of sharing. Spend that little bit of extra time to make sure that they are memorable.
Visuals
Spend time creating or commissioning enticing visuals. Social media appeals to the visual, fast-paced aspect of human nature, so you need to capitalize on that fact. Use high-quality videos, infographics, original photography, and appropriate GIFs to draw customer attention to your posts.
Do Your Research
Stay on Target
Narrowing down your target audience is something you should have done before starting your company, but you can continuously refine it. Figure out what social media platforms your target audience uses, and focus more heavily on that.
If you are a small construction company, your target audience probably isn’t hanging out on Twitter. LinkedIn might be a better platform on which to rely.
Analyze, Analyze, Analyze
Pay close attention to what type of posts are being liked, shared, and linked. Look for commonalities, and tailor your future content to get the same kind of response. Similarly, keep an eye on your competitors and look out for any viral content that they are producing. Constantly seek to improve upon their current successes while building up your own repertoire.
If your social media campaign isn’t quite where you’d like it to be, don’t worry. It takes time and elbow grease to create the kind of shareworthy content that will put you above your competitors.
There’s no denying the importance of standing out through social media campaigns. If you can nail them, you’ll score a major victory for your business growth.