Running A Small Business? You Need To Get Social!

For small businesses, having a flexible and agile social media marketing strategy is vital for success. You need to have the ability to reach current clients and potential customers in ways that the big-box stores have on lock-and-key. However, with a little bit of elbow grease ingenuity, you can take advantage of massively popular media streams to get your message in front of consumers that are ready to bring you business.

What is this small business marketing silver bullet? An engaging social media marketing strategy.

Getting Social With Your Small Business

If you want to take advantage of everything social media has to offer, here are four quick tips for getting started with you own social media marketing strategy:

Step 1: Define Goals & Build Strategy

Like any marketing strategy, you do not want to simply jump in head-first without asking yourself: What are my goals?

- Are you looking to increase brand engagement through your channels?
- Do you have specials and discounts that you can share through a targeted online social space?
- Will you start using social media advertising to reach new customers?
- Does your brand need to increase its personality with real, engaging social media posts?

Having a roadmap will make all the difference when it comes to launching your social media marketing plan.

Step 2: Build Your Presence On Multiple Platforms

There was a time when you could simply create a Facebook account for your business and leave it at that. However, in today’s always-online world, there are countless social media streams that are tailored to specific uses and engage specific demographics. Depending on your audience, your goals, and your products or services, specific channels may be more effective than others. However, you should have a variety of social media platforms running simultaneously to take advantage of the unique benefits of each.

Step 3: Build Consistent & Platform-Appropriate Content

An easy way to ensure that your social media channel falls flat is to launch it without a stream of constant content. Before you start any particular platform, make sure you have a stockpile of pre-built content that features your brand’s identity, your products or services, and that they are built to fit the audience of each stream.

Posting on Instagram? Go with short and fun videos or pictures. Twitter? Consider links to your landing pages. Facebook? A combination of interesting content and outbound links to your website. Whatever you do, keep posting every day to build your audience!

With all that goes into creating a great social media post, it can be time-consuming and overwhelming to constantly create and post your content manually each time you want to reach your social media audience.

Luckily, there are fantastic social media scheduling and analytics systems out on the market today that allow you to create, schedule, post, and respond to content across your channels – as well as follow important metrics to make sure you are hitting your goals. At various different prices and capabilities, make sure you do your homework to find the scheduler that is right for you.