According to the latest findings by DataReportal, 4.14 billion people around the world are now using social media platforms.
That accounts for more than half of the world’s population. The penetration rate is the highest of all times and is expected to surge even higher in the next five years.
According to the GlobalWebIndex 2019, people spend an average of 3 hours on social media each day. The time they spend on the social channels and the content that comes across them shapes their perspective, trust, and purchasing decisions.
The above statistics demonstrate the potential of social media for marketing purposes. Brands that wish to extend their reach to outdo competitors should now shift their gear towards an ultimate social media marketing strategy!
If we look into the possibilities of a business’s success by leveraging social media, there are many. As the platforms are used by people of all ages and backgrounds, not only your reach is widespread, but it can give your brand a chance to shine locally as well as on an international level.
You can easily generate leads for your sales funnel, get engagements, and even attain direct sales if your strategy is right.
Want to know the best tips for leveraging social media marketing to surmount your business? Read on to learn our eight tips to help you craft a successful social media strategy.
1. Set your marketing goals for the year
The first piece of advice that any marketing guru would give you is to define your goals by crafting a calculated strategy for every platform. Ben Donkers, the founder of Sensi Seeds, provides clear and straightforward advice for social media marketing.
“When setting social marketing goals for the year, be specific and focused. It will assist you in aligning the content calendar for campaigns and make them achievable”, he says.
It is not recommended to mindlessly copy competitors’ strategies just because their’s was successful. Unless that strategy aligns with your own goals and specific brand attributes, it may go in vain. In contrast, a purposeful gameplan with practical goals will help your brand escalate more quickly.
Your goals can include getting more traffic to your website from social media, gaining a set number of followers, or running x number of campaigns in the year.
2. Respond to your customer’s concerns
Every social media platform has a comment section on every post you make. Your customers use this section to engage with you, praise you, and also voice their concerns.
Several brands have a following in millions on social media. Yet, we spot their comment sections full of disappointed customers who do not get a response. This is a grave mistake that can harm a brand’s reputation as the customers believe they aren’t getting heard.
Your social media management team must be prepared to handle a complaining customer timely and congenially. A public response from your team will harbor trust among the followers. They will realize that satisfying a customer is your brand’s top priority.
See how KFC realized their consumers’ objections and rectified their mistake with a hashtag integrated campaign.
3. “Tag A Friend” contests
On platforms where users frequently interact with their friends and family, you can run interesting campaigns to encourage followers to tag their friends. These contests may be in response to a current global affair or a product launch.
Watching fun-filled tag-a-friend contests by several brands, you will notice that humor can increase engagement tremendously. Therefore, even a funny, relatable meme or video can turn into a highly engaging post.
4. Engage with followers and fans
If you are a new brand with relatively fewer followers, engaging with them by reposting their content and responding to each and every comment may be easier for you.
But even if you have established a strong presence and have a lot of fans and followers, you should not ignore engaging with them occasionally.
Social media platforms get an update in their algorithms. According to the current algorithms, posts on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn that get high engagements within an hour are shown on top of the followers’ feeds.
Creating a Facebook group is also a brilliant strategy to foster relationships with your audience as you can engage with them meaningfully. Instant Pot’s Community on Facebook is a group with over 2.8 million members.
The brand’s Facebook group is an excellent example of a well-built community where members share recipes, hacks and ask kitchen-related queries. Implementing tips for Facebook marketing can significantly enhance the effectiveness of such strategies, ensuring a broader and more engaged audience.
5. Craft a narrative around your product
You can use your social media posts for storytelling purposes. Be it a series of posts that craft a narrative or a campaign that touches people’s hearts, many brands use the power of storytelling these days.
Product promotion is an art that yields productive results if you do it by tugging at people’s emotions.
When a customer can relate to a story, it will immensely benefit the brand. Dove, with its “Courage, is beautiful” campaign, is a brand that implies storytelling by defying all odds and promotes real beauty, unlike other competitor brands.
6. Partner with influence
Below is an example of a highly successful collaboration between Tesco and the celebrity chef Jamie Oliver.
7. Live QnAs sessions
On Facebook, Instagram, and Youtube, live sessions are gaining popularity due to the fantastic response they get. Brands can use this opportunity to interact with their audience by holding giveaways, announcements, or QnA session on live videos.
Among all the platforms, Instagram live stories work the best for brand marketing. According to Sprout Social, reaching consumers via Instagram can result in an engagement rate of 1.173% per post.
Try the medium for your live sessions by choosing the topic of discussion that would interest your customers the most.
8. Use the power of video content
Who doesn’t love to watch exciting videos?
Video content is expected to take over 80% of internet traffic in the next four years. Therefore, leveraging video content on social media may be the most efficient strategy for marketing your brand.
You can create high-quality explainer videos to promote your product by letting the audience get in-depth knowledge about it.
Making fun videos by using humor also works well for product promotion. Other than that, you can post BTS videos to show the followers a sneak peek of the people who run the brand.
9. Leverage Social Listening Tools
You can also leverage social listening tools like Notifier to watch for keywords your potential customers might mention. It can automate a lot of the hassle of listening for you and clue you in to new insights across social media and the internet as a whole.
Summing Up
Actionable strategies on your social media platforms may be an effective way to turn your followers into customers. They can help bring high engagements and create a strong brand identity.
The right strategies may turn your social media into a sales magnet. We would love to get your feedback on which social media marketing tips you found the most beneficial for your brand.
AUTHOR BIO
Mary Warner is an enthusiast blogger. Her compelling research and communication capabilities exchange offerings that have value for the reader.
Her passion for writing has been an ever-evolving affair. She loves to share her views related to the latest trends in marketing, technology, eCommerce, and the like.
