5 Tips for Developing an Effective Social Media Strategy for your Business
As a business owner, our days are filled with list upon list of things we “should be doing.” If you take a day off, you have to plan for it or make up for it later, especially if you’re a solopreneur like many of us. So, the last thing you probably want to do is spend hours on marketing and social media that doesn’t get you any results. We get it! Neither do we.
Social media isn’t just about how your business looks online and how aesthetically pleasing your post designs are. More and more we are seeing organic, REAL content that isn’t perfect but receives better results than those that are “perfect.” Even big brands are using UGC (User Generated Content) to promote their goods and services to become more relatable to their target audience, which could be you or me.
The point is your content doesn’t have to be movie quality to get the point across and to engage and captivate your audience and ideal customers. That also means, you shouldn’t be paying movie production fees in order to get content creation for your business either.
We have put together 5 tips to help you determine a social media strategy that will help your business see success online, in a personalized manner, that doesn’t take up all of your time doing so.
#1: Really get to know your target audience.
Understand who they are, what problems they have that you can provide a solution for, and what outcome your solution offers.
You can start by working backwards. What does your product or service do? Who would benefit from that product or service? What problems would that person be dealing with to force them into seeking out help and be willing to purchase that product or service from your business?
When planning content pillars (key themes/topics) for your social media, consider breaking down each individual need into a topic and then create multiple posts, REELs, infographics, or blog posts about each individual topic.
#2: Find out where the majority of your target audience will be.
Based on the type of person your target customer is (demographics, behaviors, and interests) do some research to figure out which social media platforms will best serve them, and in turn, will best serve your business.
From there, further define WHY they are on that platform. If your business is on LinkedIn (educational/longer attention span), your content will look and target a little differently than if your business would on TikTok (entertainment/short attention span.) If your target audience tends to try to DIY their problem first, YouTube, Pinterest and blogs/articles on your website may be your best options.
#3: Define clear goals that prove success.
Success looks different for every business. It’s true. You should only compare your social media results with those from your account the month, quarter, or even year prior. Why is that? There are many different variables that go into building and growing a business and social media following. Every other business is in a different phase of that process than your business is. You can keep track of metrics from other businesses as a means of benchmarking your industry or niche and providing a realistic goal to work towards.
Your goals or KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) should go hand and hand with your sales process and your overall company goals for the year. If your sales process routes potential customers to book a demo or consultation call, a key metric for your social media performance could be link clicks. If they click a link in a post that takes them to your landing page, your social media has moved them one step closer to becoming a new customer or client. If one of your company goals for the year is to grow your awareness in a new region or city, a great metric to track is followers by city to see if the percentage is increasing due to your efforts.
#4: Post consistently by batching content.
This can be easier said than done and requires a good deal of understanding and focus. First, you need to understand everything mentioned above to have a clear idea of what to post so you’re not recreating the wheel with every content piece. Then, you can begin breaking that information down into bite-sized pieces that are easily consumed by your ideal customer or client. Human attention spans are getting shorter, hence the use of bullet points and bolded key thoughts in this blog post to keep your attention and call-out important information.
Once you have laid the foundation of when, where how and what you will be posting on your social media platforms, get to work on the videos or creatives to convey those ideas to your audience. Use the K.I.S.S. acronym - Keep. It. Simple. Silly. (I like this version better than the original.) Try not to include too much information or over complicate things; this takes up too much of your readers time and attention and will not be as successful generally than a quick, to the point caption or attention grabbing “hook.” If you use hooks, please do not partake in click bate.
#5: Engage and encourage interactions.
Your social media business accounts aren’t just meant to be digital billboards. Use them to encourage community within your target audience, service locations, local/niche groups, and in your comment responses.
A few ideas on how to do this are: join groups where your target audience is and provide industry knowledge posting as your business page, ask questions in your posts or stories to let people answer or give their opinions, or respond to comments on your posts and try to include a relevant follow-up question. If someone asks a question, that is a good indicator that you may need to talk/post about that topic more to inform others, since they could have that same question but not ask.
