Social Media has become essential to the way businesses operate in the modern world. Whether you run a small, independent store, or a multi-million dollar company, socials are how most customers will discover and interact with you. It’s important to as yourself whether your company is doing enough to take advantage of these free, wide-reaching, accessible platforms for the promotion. Let’s take a look at the essential steps to make the most of your social media presence.
Video
Social media sites are multi-media platforms, giving you fantastic opportunities to make a first impression. Use as many mediums as you can to make your profiles far more engaging and to maximize your chances of catching a potential client’s eye.
A great video is more likely to stop potential clients as they scroll through their feed, especially as most sites feature auto-play algorithms which will recommend your video to a wide range of people. It can also be the focal point that introduces your product, brand, office, and even staff! Your pages will look dynamic and interesting, and seeing a brand representative on a video makes them seem far more accessible and relatable.
The key to this is to get a professional video production company to use its talents and equipment to show off everything your business has to offer. You should consult with your production company and have in-depth meetings to decide what tone and image you are trying to cultivate. A good production company will produce tailor-made content to fit your brand perfectly.
Scheduling
The key to gaining a following is regularity. You should be on your follower’s feed as frequently as you can. You should use your analytics to figure out when your posts get the biggest response and post regularly around those times.
If you build your social media presence correctly, you should have 4-5 accounts across various social media sites. To keep track of this, it would be advisable to use a social media management system that will allow you to schedule your posts across multiple socials, track your data trends, and keep on top of your analytics. Use these tools to see what connects with audiences, then do more of that!
Maintaining your schedule takes plenty of work, but you will notice the difference, as will your followers!
Design
The most popular business accounts always have a regular design scheme which they use on every post. This doesn’t have to be the exact same template every time, but a consistent color scheme or visual motif will subconsciously connect with your followers before they’ve even read your post.
As your followers will be using social media for several hours a day, they immediately know the difference between a good post and a bad one. You can use online graphic design tools to make each post look professional and eye-catching. These sites are designed to be easy to use and perfect for social media dimensions.
Influencers
One of the main benefits of social media is the community it creates. Appealing to a community is a fantastic way to get your name seen all across the internet. You have to consider your target demographic and work towards the content they usually consume, this will help you to design your posts specifically to attract your potential customers.
An easy way to reach an audience and begin to form a connection is by sponsoring an influencer. Influencers reach a wide audience and their endorsement is a great way to boost your online presence. Forming relationships with influencers brings a large crowd who trust that person’s recommendation, but don’t stop there! Offer discount codes or other goodies to give something back to your newfound audience.
Interaction
Catching an audience’s attention is a great start, but it isn’t enough. You have to use your newfound presence to build your own community. If you build followers and are active, then you stand a good chance of being verified, which marks you as a trustworthy and genuine account.
Interacting with your audience will increase your follower count and the relationship with those followers exponentially. The point of social media is to be engaging and real, so use your social profiles to show your genuine side. Answer questions or reply to comments yourselves to add a personal touch and make your audience far more likely to come back.
Live
Live streams are a great way to connect with your followers and show them some of the inner workings of your business. Approaching a live stream with confidence and charisma shows off the friendly and approachable side of your business.
Use live streams to generate some buzz by counting down to them over several days. Make sure you have an activity or script prepared so it runs as smoothly as possible. Q&A sessions often work fantastically, or you could set up a competition on your page and judge the results live! Whatever you choose to do, going live is a great way to increase your figures and engage with a large amount of your audience at once.
If you do go live, make sure you’re using good quality equipment and the best internet you can manage, the last thing you need is your stream failing due to technical difficulties.
Campaigns
Social media campaigns are an essential way to boost your business. You could run an advertising campaign with its own design scheme to differentiate it from your feed. Build the scheme around an offer or sale to generate some excitement and post about it more and more each day until the deal is off.
You don’t have to use social media campaigns to sell your own products. You could set up a meeting to discuss your followers and analyze your most popular content. Using this data, you could imagine a new regular series that would run on your channels. This could be a slightly different post from your usual which goes out once a week with its own spin. A behind-the-scenes story, or just a weekly update!
You’ll find that special posts will entice your followers back to your pages, and help to build up that vital community.
