Perception is everything, especially online and as a business owner this means your online presence is perhaps your most important method to market your business both locally and internationally if you wish. It doesn’t matter if your business is online or not, it has to be represented online and today we’re going to discuss the importance of social media and how a business should establish its identity online.
Every social media platform has its own personally, its ways of doing this and presenting your information, in a similar fashion your business brand is always your business brand. This means that no matter what social platform someone encounters your brand on, it should basically be the same just adjusted slightly to fit in with the personality of the social media platform. But it’s not changed all that much because you want your audience to recognize you and interact with you.
Social media platforms are constantly evolving with new features being added and modifications being made. This means that your profile that you worked so hard to complete fully might not be complete tomorrow, so ensure it is up-to-date by checking it often, updating the things that have changed, and adding in new information as the social media platform creates new ways for you to share.
One of the major ways to get social media to work for you is to actually get involved and post regular posts and updates. This obviously takes content and even though it’s fine to use curated content (other peoples content) don’t just share this, always share some of your own original content to maximize results and to drive people into your sales funnel. You also want to post updates multiple times per day and not just once a day, social media is crowed and people’s attention is always on the latest and greatest posts so that blog post you want to share, share it twice in a day instead of just once.
Unless you have a small army of staff you don’t want to be on every social media platform. I’ve had to close down my company Facebook page simply because I can do two platforms really well, but I can’t do three. For me Twitter and LinkedIn are the two platforms I have chosen, I’m passionate about them and more importantly my audience is there.
If you can afford to outsource your social media workload or have staff members to spare then by all means try and conquer every social media platform. But if it’s just you, take it easy and become the best you can be on one or two platforms, if you’re like me you’ll get much better results.
You don’t want to rehash the exact same content in the exact same words on each social media network. For example, when you share a blog post you wrote promoting your content marketing services or your latest and greatest product, you want to share it with a special blurb for each different networks, so that you reach both audiences.
Social media isn’t just about promoting your content, in fact it’s all about engaging with your audience and that means engaging with them. Talk to people, answer questions and share your knowledge as you engage with them, you’ll be amazed at the response.
Even if you automate most of your social media marketing, it’s imperative that you spend time interacting personally with your audience, this is what works and what turns an audience into fans… automation is great but it only goes so far, people like to interact with people, not machines.
When someone you follow or know shares something your audience will find interesting, share it. The people you share and congratulate and interact with, will do the same for you. Plus, it’s another form of content that can help establish expertise.
Most social media platforms have some forms of groups that you can join. Even Pinterest has group pin boards that you can join. Joining these, then interacting with other members of the group, is a great way to network and develop relationships.
Every business should have a social media presence, it complements a website perfectly and helps drive people to it, whilst reaching a potential new audience and developing deeper more personal relationships. Use the social media to promote what you put on your website, as well as to stimulate sales of your products and services and watch those conversion rates improve.