Are you just getting started with your social media marketing strategy?

Wondering how to create an effective plan for your small business?

If you’re feeling overwhelmed and confused about how to get started with social media marketing, we’ve got you covered.

Here are 7 tips to help you get started with marketing on social media.

1. Identify social media goals and objectives

It’s important to have a well-planned, goal-oriented approach to your social media marketing. Simply just dive in without a careful, planned approach just because “everyone” is doing it could be a very bad idea!

List down your main business goals and branding objectives. The more specific you are about your goals, the better your chance of building an effective social media plan for your small business.

“Good content always has an objective; it’s created with intent. It therefore carries triggers to action.”

~ Ann Handley

Some examples of business and social media objectives include:

Increase sales
Drive more traffic to websites or blogs
Build your email list
Build referrals
Grow your social media followers
Get more reposts by subscribers
Create real customer loyalty
Build brand awareness
Create a brand voice
Target new customers
Build customer relationships
Get new ideas for your products or services
Get feedback on your current products or services
Position your company or yourself as an authority in your niche

2. Define your targeted audience

“Who is your ideal customer?”

To maximize your social media marketing efforts, it’s important to know who your customers are. Your goal is to find out which social media platforms that your audience spend most of their time on.

Use demographic segment to start describing your target audience. Some of the typical demographic factors like age, gender, occupation, family size, income, geographical location and ethnicity.

By allocation some time to understand these segments, it will help you to create the right content and design effective marketing campaigns.

3. Choose the best social media to engage on

“Pick one network and do it well first. Choose one that you like to use personally and are comfortable using. Master it.”~ Julia C. Campbell, J Campbell Social Marketing

You may want to participate in more than one social networks that share that the same demographic data of your audience. But it’s always smart to start with one social media channel.

Don’t spread yourself too thin by signing up for multiple social media sites all at once. Take time to learn how to master one platform effectively before moving onto the others, and ultimately conquering all channels.

4. Determine your social media time budget

“How much time should you spend on social media marketing?”

While social media is free, it can still demand a significant commitment of time and efforts. Using social media in your marketing strategy isn’t completely free after all. You could easily spend hours each day to engage on the social media sites.

And there’s no exact formula in determining how much time you should spend on your social networks. Thus, I suggest you create a schedule for your activity on social media- list down important things to do on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. Don’t forget to do some tests and find out what works best for you.

5. Use a Social Media Management Tool

After you’ve developed a plan for your social media marketing, you’ll need to choose a social media management tool. By using the right social media tool, it can save you lots of time and help to maximize your marketing efforts.

Decide what features of the tool that your business needs the most. Most of the social media tools allow you to set up notifications, create groups, create content, publish content on specific social networks, monitor hashtags and keywords, understand your audience and analyze your performance.

If you’re just started or don’t have budget to commit to any premium tool at the moment, don’t let this stop you, use this FREE tools to help you in your social media marketing:

Sign up a free account with Apphi to manage unlimited Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Create a free Tailwind account to schedule for free up to 30 Instagram posts and 100 Pinterest Pins for Free .

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6. Analyze Performance and Track Trends

The key to having an effective social media strategy is listening to what your audience has to say, your competitors and the market in general.

Make full use of all the data that you have by monitoring, assessing and analyzing the insights. This can help you to understand your customer better and improve your social media strategy.

Besides that, you can use social media to look for content trends. Keeping up with industry trends can help you to create relevant content that the audience wants.

7. Creating a consistent social media presence

Using consistent branding across social networks can help you cultivate a loyal customer following.

The identity of your brand is determined by your logo, bio, colors, layout, headshot, location and other elements. You want to keep your brand design, graphic elements, messages and content as consistent as possible across all your social media channels.

There are many benefits of having a consistent branding:

customers recognize your brand easily
Makes your brand feel more dependable and trustable
Differentiate your business from competitors
Boost your authority in the industry
Increase customer loyalty and engagement

Conclusion

Although social media is free, it consumes lots of time and effort to establish a brand presence for your small business. Always start with a clear social strategy in mind and follow it through so that you can get the most out of this social media “Goldmine”.

Are you ready to get started with marketing on social media?

Do you have any tips or tricks you’d like to share? Go on and let me know in the comments below, We’d love to hear from you.

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