Want to craft a social media strategy that will boost your brand and your small business?
Wondering which social media platform will serve your company’s needs?
Social media is one of the best ways to promote your small business online for relatively little investment. Although it’s free to get started with social media, you might want to choose those that offer the best potential to reach your target audience.
As a small business owner, you probably deal with numerous constraints- time being one of the most important things when it comes to social media. This is why it’s important to create a social marketing plan and select the platforms that best for your needs.
You have to do some upfront research and due diligence so you can focus on platforms that’ll give you a direct ROI.
How do you find the best social media platform for your small business?
Deciding which social media platform will best serve your company’s needs can be tricky. Let’s look at what differentiates these popular platforms, comparing various main metrics and make the best decision based on the important factors.
Related:
- 7 Tips to get started with social media for your small business
- 7 Best Time-Saving Instagram Scheduling Tools
Choosing the Right Social Media Platform for Your Business
Facebook is the most popular social media platform by far. Being the most frequently used platform among social media users, almost any business can benefit from having a Facebook page.
Facebook is right for you…if you want to reach a broad network. Facebook has over 2.6 billion active monthly users for Q1 202o. I would say it’s just too big to ignore.
But it isn’t about selling. Your aim is to build a long-term relationship with your audience and let your customers know the people behind your company. It might be a great platform to build loyal followers and generate leads.
Related: Social media marketing on Facebook is as tough as SEO!
Primary Purpose:
- To build a community presence and brand loyalty.
- To establish your business as an authority in your industry/ niche
Unique Attributes:
- Reach a broad group of people
- Portray your business in a friendly manner
- Enable direct communication with your customers
- Create paid ads to drive more traffic to your website or blog
- Represent your business in various ways- sharing video, detailed information about your products or services, testimonial, personal stories
Twitter is a short message communication tool that allows you to tweet or send out a message (maximum 140-characters long) to all your followers.
You can include a link to your web content (blog post, website, PDF document), video, gif or picture in your tweets.
Twitter is right for you… If you want to reach a younger audience, both men and women. It’s especially useful if you want to reach out to people, expect immediate responses and are ready to engage in the conversations. This is a great two-way platform for businesses that have things to say frequently and are eager to engage directly with followers.
Related: Top 5 free tools to manage Twitter accounts (free Tips included)
Primary Purpose:
- Share the latest updates and breaking news
- Promote new content, products, services, contests or giveaways
- Ask any questions and get instant feedback or opinion from your subscribers
Unique Attributes:
- Appealing to those looking for quick information, latest company news, and instant response to questions about products, services or events
- Share your business story with the Twitter community
- Build your brand presence online
- Give people useful information and answer their questions
- Drive traffic to your website and blog by creating a tweet around a link.
- Create and organize your lists so that you can focus on information coming from specific people and groups
- Expand audience and online conversations with hashtags
- Start conversations with customers
Pinterest is more like a visual search engine that allows users to pin or repin videos and images to their pinboards.
Pinterest is right for you… if you want to target a female audience. With 45% online women are Pinterest users, it is a great platform for female-focused companies.
If you’re in a highly visual industry like fashion, food, art, home decor, interior design or food, where you can deliver a strong message about your products and services through stunning videos or photos, then you should start engaging on Pinterest to drive targeted traffic to your website.
You can even sell your products with Pinterest buy button with just a click of a button.
Primary Purpose: Act as a visual discovery platform to promote your products and services through creative boards.
Unique Attributes:
- Visually promote your products and services
- Drive traffic to your content, website and blog
- Sell your products through Pinterest buy button
Related:
- Pinterest for Business: Step-By-Step Guide to Getting Started on Pinterest
- 10 Strategic Ways to Use Pinterest to Drive Blog Traffic
- How to Use Tailwind to Automatically Grow Your Blog Traffic in 8 Easy Steps
- How to Grow Your Pinterest (Pinterest Best Practices 2020)
With over 1 billion users and more than 500 million of those Instagrammers using the app every single day, it’s no doubt you can reach your ideal audience no matter who your audience is- age, gender, race, religion, occupation etc.
However, it’s getting harder to reach your target audience organically. Users no longer view the content in chronological order. In fact, Instagram keeps updating with their algorithm that not many of us will understand.
You might need to have a strategic plan if you want to use it as a marketing tool.
Instagram is right for you… if you want to reach a younger audience. It’s particularly appealing if you can showcase a visual aspect of what you do and what your customers are interested in.
Related reading:
- 7 Best Time-Saving Instagram Scheduling Tools
- 7 Best Instagram Link In Bio Tools of 2020
- 7 Smart Ways to Add Clickable Links on Instagram
- 8 Best Apps For Instagram Stories: Level Up Your Visual Content
- How to create Instagram Stories Images for your business
Primary Purpose: Acts as a visually-driven platform to broaden your reach and create more meaningful connections with your target audience, showcase your products and services, share your company updates and news.
Unique Attributes:
- Drive brand awareness and increase customer base through visuals
- Advertise to potential customers through Photo ads, Video ads, Carousel ads, and Stories ads.
- Increase brand loyalty
- Encourage direct communication and engage with your customers
- Drive more traffic to your website or blog through profile bio link
- Represent your business in various ways- sharing videos, beautiful photos, showcase behind the scenes content, product demo, live stories
- Connect with your followers and tell your story visually
- Expand your potential customers with hashtags
LinkedIn is one of the largest professional networks in the world. It’s a great platform for you to share the latest news, upcoming events and any updates of your company.
LinkedIn is right for you… if you are in B2B or in any niche where you can offer useful information and in-depth insights into your potential professional future. You’ll be able to connect with professionals in your industry as well as potential customers.
Primary Purpose
Grow your business connections and engage with your target audience
Unique Attributes:
- Generates leads and drives more traffic to your website and blog
- Engage with potential customers
- Connect with other professionals in your industry
- Join discussions and groups where you can ask and answer questions, offer your expertise.
Conclusion
It takes an enormous amount of time and effort to be on all social media platforms. The truth is you don’t have to be active on every social channel. Choose 3 platforms that will yield the best results, monitor and analyze them closely.
Social media is a two-way channel, it will only work if you stay involved.
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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