Social media is an interactive medium which suddenly took the world by storm. It has become something that no other business. Small, large, local or global businesses can’t afford to ignore social media. To date, there are 1.28 billion active Facebook users. It is the world’s most popular social media network.
Apart from that, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google + and other social media sites also have hundreds of millions. In the United States, there are about 90% of small businesses engaged in social media. Gone are the days when social media was just a fad and a way to connect with other people. Now, 9 out of =10 businesses use social media to grow their business.
We’ve compiled some tips for online marketers who are beginners in social media marketing. Follow these tips to improve your social media marketing strategy:
1. Quality First
One mistake most marketers do is that they often focus on quantity, instead of the quality. Don’t just post whichever you feel is nice for your audience.
Online marketers should be more selective in terms of the quality of content you are sharing. Your content should stand out from all the noise and help you build a loyal fan base.
If you’re more selective, your content will have a higher chance of standing out. Collect potential posts and filter them according to the best ones. It can be time-consuming to filter out your content but the impact can be bigger.
2. Use images
The audience are visual creatures. They will easily relate to visual content than text-based content. Images in Facebook get 53% more likes and attract 104% more comments.
Adding posts with images is the best way to engage your audience in your social media profiles.
3. User-generated content
This type of content is your best friend. It will save you time finding content and also have a strong impact on social media. Posting user-generated content is easier for your fans to connect with you. If you find it hard to look for UGCs, you can always use other apps which provide product reviews for free.
4. Follow the P-O-S-T
It can be tough when you’re just starting. If you want to maximize your efforts, you need to follow the P-O-S-T method to maximize your social media marketing efforts:
- Pillars of content – Find 3-5 content categories which you want to post
- Outreach – Reach out to individuals through social media. Provide them value and build your number of followers
- Scheduling – You can schedule your posts using Buffer/Hootsuite
- Timing – Analyze the times when your audience are active and post accordingly
5. Ask your customers to spread the word
Social media has the power to spread one’s post to hundreds of other individuals. Tap into this capability and make it easy for your customers to spread the word about your business.
Make sure you add share buttons, special social coupons, social reviews and a number of other social integrations that will help make your site more social friendly. Thus, resulting in a free viral traffic directed to your site.
6. Track and monitor results
Most tools nowadays provide free analytics from engagement to clicks and a breakdown by country and age. In this day and age, information is power. You need to have instant access to information and stats that matter.
Here are some of the metrics which you should track:
- Engagement levels per post with a breakdown by post type
- Number of clicks per post
- Total purchases by social, with a breakdown by channel
- Total visitors by social (compared to other traffic channels)
- Performance of social traffic (time on site, pages per view)
- New vs returning for social traffic
- Performance of social traffic that comes from 3rd party tools
7. Advertise
Social media is not about advertising. It’s about providing value to your audience. The brand should resonate with the audience. You need to form a context between the brand and the individual. Once that is formed, that person will help you spread the word and eventually, buy your products.
With this approach, you can advertise on social media. Always remember that your advertisement should pose a value to the community.
8. Be creative
Social media requires online marketers to think out of the box and be more creative. One of the ways to make your business remarkable is in your marketing. Check on other social media marketing success stories for inspiration. See how others do their online marketing and see how your efforts match.
Brainstorm ideas each week and see what is unique out of those ideas. Once a month, run a short campaign that’s out of the box and no one has tried before.
Here are some ideas:
- Pick a date and set a theme
- Online treasure hunt
- Interview top experts in your niche and publish a serious of interviews on your website/blog.
- Host meetups where customers can come and meet the people behind your business.
9. Be social. Have a social mindset
You need to adopt the social mindset when you’re marketing in social media. Keep in mind that people are not just visual, but also social. They are used to seeing social signs all over the net. You need to embed the social factor in your channels and the returns will be big and your social media marketing efforts won’t go to waste.
10. Social Campaigns
Every marketer needs to know how to run a social campaign. Before you start running a campaign, keep these in mind.
1. Speak the language of your audience
You won’t be able to connect with your audience if you don’t speak their language. You need to learn how to connect with them so you won’t lose them.
2. Run special campaigns
Most brands run normal campaigns which fail to stand out from the noise. If you’re going to run campaigns, make sure they’re special. If it’s remarkable, the virality of the post will make it spread to more people.
3. Think of something your audience would die for
If the prize is money, this won’t appeal too much to your audience. Think creatively and think of other things which your audience would die for. You need to make the campaign more interesting.
Punit 
Krishan Jangir