Social media has become a major part of our lives. From 15-second entertainment clips to videos on how-to, recipes, and shops, everything one needs in their day-to-day life is available on social media now. So, it will be catastrophic for any business to not be present on social media. Social media allows you to reach a global audience—4.8 billion active users—while sitting in your office in a far-off location. But it is one thing to be present on a social channel and another to be actively engaged on it. To have greater success, you need to follow social media best practices to reach your goals and have better connectivity with your loyal customers.
In this blog, we share the 10 best social media practices that you must follow to increase your chances of running a successful business.
1. What are your goals?
What is it that you hope to gain by bringing your brand out on a social media channel? Is it to create brand awareness to get more followers, or is it to increase your sales? By having a clear idea of your objective, you can better plan your social media strategies and present your brand on social media platforms that best meet your requirements. It will also help you keep a budget in mind to support the social media campaigns that will help you reach your goals.
2. Know your target audience
To sell any product or service, you need to know who your customers are. Why would they want to buy your product? What is so special about your service that they’ll pick you over the others? So, to be able to sell your products and services, you need to understand your potential buyers. You can create a buyer persona for your targeted customers, keeping in mind their interests and passions. For example, what kind of social media channel they prefer to use, what devices they use to check their socials, and what kind of hobbies they have. By getting answers to these questions, you’d have some idea of the kind of people who’d prefer to choose your brand over the rest of the market. And accordingly, you can channel your efforts into creating content for them on social media channels.
3. What are your competitors doing?
If you really want to succeed in the online space, you can’t turn a blind eye to your competition. It is always a good idea to keep an eye on your competition to see what social media marketing strategies are working for them. By doing so, you would be better prepared to work on your own campaigns and bring out content that resonates with your customers. Check if they are creating more videos to engage with their audience or collaborating with influencers to sell their products. Always remember that social media is an ever-changing game. What is in demand right now may become obsolete tomorrow. So, you need to keep up with the trends and create content that keeps you above your competition.
4. Adopt a brand voice
Defining your brand’s voice is a brilliant idea to stand out from your competition. It gives the idea of consistency and builds trust. By “brand voice,” we mean having a theme for your posts on different social media channels. Maintain a color theme, fonts that you use in all your posts, a brand’s logo, and hashtags that commonly work for you. And most importantly, engage with your customers like a person, not a brand. Be human in your views and opinions, and do not try to always sell your product.
5. Engage in social listening
While it is important to keep an eye on your competition, it is equally significant to see what everyone is talking about on social media. What’s the hottest topic of discussion – a major sports win, a celebrity launching a line of product, a social cause affecting humans – what music is trending, and any news from your sector that’s causing the waves? By listening to the “noise,” you are better able to generate content that appeals to your customers and keeps your brand at the top of their minds.
6. Maintain a social media content calendar
If you want to grow on social media, you must post as per the ideal posting frequency of each social media channel. This is where a social media content calendar comes in handy. A calendar allows you to prepare your posts well in advance without having to worry about them every day. And especially if your brand is present on more than one social media channel, a calendar is a brilliant idea, as you can prepare content for weeks and months in advance. By doing this, you save time to do other things that matter to you, like answering the queries and replying to comments on posts, brainstorming for more ideas, keeping track of what’s trending on the internet, and most importantly, planning your next social media marketing campaign.
7. Optimize content for different platforms
What you post on Facebook is different from your content for TikTok. Each social media channel has its own specifications, which you must follow to appear relevant. Also, there are different types of audiences on these social channels; for example, LinkedIn is for professionals, while Instagram is for casual content. To be able to post on these different networks, you should be able to optimize content that best suits them—the hashtags that work for them, the content type and timing that are relevant, and the kinds of posts that appeal to the audience on these channels.
8. Monitor your social media strategy
There are different tools available online, such as Google Analytics, to measure the success of your campaign. Regular monitoring of your campaign allows you to make changes to strategies that are not working in favor of your brand and keep the ones that have given you a good ROI. Also, different social media platforms have their own measuring tools that give you an idea of how your content is performing online, what kind of engagement you got from a particular post, and what kind of growth you received from it. The idea behind monitoring the performance of your social media campaigns is to improve the chances of growth and get more customer engagement.
9. Share customer feedback
The idea behind social media is to create a community of like-minded people, not just followers. By getting your customers to engage with the brand in different polls and contests, you make them part of the brand and not just outsiders. Ask them to leave a comment or share their experience with their fellow customers about their buying journey, especially if it was a good one. You’ll be surprised to see how they open their hearts and get you more customers. Even in the case of a bad experience, deal with it with positivity, and if there is customer satisfaction at the end, do ask them to share their experience of how things turned out in their favor.
10. Respond to customers promptly
The best thing about social media is that as a brand, you get the chance to interact with your customers directly and not wait for feedback to reach you through different channels. But at the same time, you need to respond to their queries well and within time, or else you might lose them forever, citing a bad customer experience. Even in the case of negative feedback, make sure you respond to it politely and ask them for time to resolve the matter. Brands that engage with their customers and help them resolve their problems are more likely to get new customers than those that simply ignore the pains of their buyers.
First Choice Media is a digital marketing agency based in Vancouver, British Coumbia, Canada that helps brands build their social media presence online. Contact us to help you reach your goals by creating a customized strategy.
So if you’re looking for a partner to help your business to 10x digital growth, contact us today or email us sales@firstchoicemedia.ca . We would be happy to be part of your digital journey.
