Top tips for social media marketing
It can be pretty daunting setting out on a social media journey for your business, whether you’re a start up or an established business that has decided to utilise social channels to reach new markets. There is a lot of noise on the internet and the challenge for many businesses is how to make their voices heard above the chatter.
At Cyberfrog we have compiled some top tips for social media marketing and optimising your engagement and getting your voice, and business, noticed.
Identify your audience
It is crucial that you identify who you want to target. Who are your audience? You really need to get to know your client base and think about how to reach and expand it. Write down personas for each segment of your target market. How old are they? What stage of their life are they likely to be at? Do they have children? Are they relatively free of additional responsibility? Are they time poor? All of these things should be thought about if you are going to get to understand who it is you want to reach. If you are selling products or services to millennials, then your message will be very different to one intended to reach established businesses who may need your product or service. If you think you’re selling to everyone or anyone, think again. Nobody knows ‘everyone’ or ‘anyone’ and you won’t be able to reach them.
Where are they?
Once you have identified your audience you need to find out what digital space they are most likely to be inhabiting. If you are a B2B company then you will probably want to look at LinkedIn and Twitter before you consider Instagram or Snapchat. If you are selling to a generation over 30, then Facebook is probably going to be better than Instagram, if you want to reach millennials and Gen Z, then Instagram stories and Snapchat are where you will find them. If you are targeting a broad range of age and type, then tailor your message to the platform and try to connect with who you are targeting there. Your message will be presented differently to different personas.
Consistency & posting times
Consistency is key when managing your social channels. There is no point in bombarding people one day and then disappearing for two weeks before returning. If you want to maximise your efforts, then post regularly and consistently. It also means posting at times that your target audience is likely to be online. There is no point in posting great content at 3am when there’s nobody around to see it.
What are you offering your audience?
The whole point of social media is that it’s an enjoyable place for people to spend time. If all you’re doing is shouting aggressive sales messages, people will turn off pretty quickly and unfollow you. Think carefully about what you can offer. This can be a good mix of advice, information and humour alongside your sales message. Think about the benefits of what you offer and make sure these are clear to your audience. You need to offer something that differentiates you from your competitors and keeps people interested. Make sure your content is engaging, informative, benefit-driven and gives people a reason to keep coming back.
Get organised
Being organised will help you to plan what you want to say and ensure consistency in your accounts. There are free planning and scheduling tools available to use and these can be used to post when you aren’t able to. Don’t rely on them for everything though, real engagement with your followers will keep your account authentic and allow you to connect with your audience.
Look at your metrics
Look at the free metrics and insights available within the platforms. Look at what has gone well and what hasn’t. Note the times you post and measure what impact that has. If you can see that a certain type of post is working, then try that again. If your main aim is to try and drive traffic to a website, then install Google Analytics to see where your traffic is coming from.
Look for the free training around paid-for marketing
There is free training provided by Google Analytics to help you make the most out of the platform https://analytics.google.com/analytics/academy/ and Facebook & Instagram provide free training courses at https://www.facebook.com/business/learn/courses. There are some good and informative blogs available on websites such as Hootsuite and Hubspot and some great influencers such as Larry Kim and Rand Fishkin to follow who are always giving excellent advice. Never stop learning and improving and if you need some extra guidance on planning an effective online marketing strategy, then please contact us for a chat. We’re very friendly and happy to help.
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