Everything and everyone can be found on social media these days—whether it’s a multi-billion-dollar company advertising their latest products, news outlets bringing you real-time updates, or your great-aunt sending out embarrassing inquiries meant for Google Search. With such a large audience, unlimited content, a seemingly endless number of platforms to choose from, and ever-changing algorithms and best practices, things can get overwhelming quickly! How do you know where to start? What happens once you do? Is social media even worth your time?
While getting started may seem intimidating and staying engaged could be tedious, we’re confident it’s worth it! Organic posting and engagement are FREE, wide-reaching, and allow you to interact directly with potential customers—what traditional marketing channels can make all those claims?
Here are some steps to help get you started and successfully guide you as you begin your social media journey:
- Define your goals: What do you want to achieve on social media? Do you want to increase brand awareness, generate leads, or provide customer support? Perhaps all the above? Understanding your goals will help you develop a focused strategy.
- Identify your target audience: Determine the demographics of your ideal follower base and where they are most active on social media. This will help you choose the right platforms and tailor your content to resonate with your audience.
- Choose the right platforms: Each platform has unique strengths and user demographics, so choose wisely based on your needs.
- Optimize your profile: Set up your profile with care. Make sure it reflects your brand identity and is consistent across platforms. Use your company logo or a professional headshot as the profile picture, write a compelling bio, and include relevant links to your website or other important resources.
- Create a content strategy: Develop a content strategy that aligns with your goals and decide what content you will create (articles, images, videos, or a combination). And make sure you create a content calendar to ensure regular and consistent posting!
- Engage and interact: Social media algorithms show people the content they are most likely to engage with based on previous content and accounts they’ve engaged with and if you aren’t engaging, it’s likely that even if people are following you, they may not be seeing your posts.
If people are engaging with you, engage back! Engagement signals to the algorithms that your content is valuable and relevant, which can improve its visibility in users' feeds, potentially reaching a wider audience.
- Promote your page: Promote your business’s profiles through your existing marketing channels, such as your website, email newsletter, and other social media accounts. Encourage your employees and existing customers to follow and share your page!
- Monitor and measure: Use social media analytics tools to track the performance of your posts, understand what content resonates best with your followers, and adjust your strategy accordingly. Pay attention to engagement metrics and follower growth.
- Stay consistent and adapt: Consistency is key to building a successful social media presence. Regularly post quality content, engage with your followers, and adapt your strategy based on insights and feedback.
Remember, building a strong social media presence takes time and effort. Be patient, stay authentic, and continuously evaluate and improve your strategy to meet the needs and preferences of all current and future followers.
