Social media marketing magazine

Social Media Marketing

SAMANTHA KEZA

Social media Marking Strategy

When it comes to social media, marketers’ top goals are advertising their products/ services and increasing their brand awareness, according to 2021 HubSpot Blog Research.

Social media marketing is the process of creating content for social media platforms to promote your products and/or services, build community with your target audience, and drive traffic to your business. With new features and platforms emerging every day, social media marketing is constantly evolving.

Social media marketing is the practice of using social media channels to sell or promote a brand, product or service. According to Hootsuite Social media marketing helps businesses:

Increase brand awareness Build engaged communities Sell products and services Measure brand sentiment Provide social customer service Advertise products and services to target audiences

Track performance and adjust larger marketing strategies accordingly.

In a landscape with more competition, content and networks than ever, a succinct strategy gives you the focus needed to say “no” to efforts that don’t serve your goals.

A social media strategy is a document outlining your social media goals, the tactics you will use to achieve them and the metrics you will track to measure your progress.

Why have a social media strategy?

According to Social Media Today, the first reason you need a social media strategy is because it will help you build a strong, organic presence online. You’ll be able to plan out posts in advance, and get them scheduled and set. All of this, in-turn, will help you stick to social media rule number one: posting consistently. The second benefit to creating and implementing a social media strategy is that it will help you save time and who wouldn’t want more time on their hands?

Yes, getting everything together to create a content calendar and content bank is a big task at first, but getting your post needs sorted and scheduled for the next week or month will greatly reduce the time you spend on actually posting each day. Having a social media strategy in place will ensure that your social media efforts are more fruitful, and are working to support your broader business goals.

Putting a strategy together includes outlining your business goals, so that you can work backwards to create posts which reinforce them. You’ll also want to outline some social media goals (and track them) so you have something to work towards, and to validate that the work you are doing is paying off.

Part of your strategy can include plugging in audience engagement elements (like polls or open-ended questions) into your updates so you can get a better handle on your audience’s pain points, and how you can provide value to solve them.

A social media strategy brings to light the elements, methods and networks which are working for your business - as well as the ones which are not. A strategy in line with your business goals will facilitate creating content that resonates with your audience, gives you the opportunity to refine the quality of your material, and enables you to think about how you can get creative with social posts. The last reason why you need a social media strategy is that it will help you stay ahead of the competition.

Steps to making a social media strategy

Research from hootsuite and sproutsocial, helps us summarize the most important steps when it comes to crafting an effective social media strategy. a The first step to creating a winning social media strategy is to establish your objectives and goals. Without goals, you have no way to measure success and return on investment (ROI). The second step is Knowing who your audience is and what they want to see on social media is key. That way you can create content that they will like, comment on, and share. It’s also critical if you want to turn social media followers into customers for your business. No matter your goals or industry, your social media strategy should be data-driven. This is why you should the third step should befocusing on the social media metrics that matter. Rather than focus on vanity metrics, dig into data that aligns directly with your goals. The fourth step is creating engaging content. Your social media marketing strategy hinges on your content.

At this point, you should have a pretty good idea of what to publish based on your goals, audience and brand identity. You probably feel confident in which networks to cover, too. Finally, the last step is making a specific social media calendar. Sharing great content is essential, of course, but it’s equally

How to set SMART social media goals

According to the 2021 Sprout Social Index™, the most common goals for social are increasing brand awareness (58%) and increasing community engagement (41%). Whether you want to build a larger following or a more active community, taking the time to define your social goals is the first step to reaching them. Increase brand awareness. This means getting your name out there. To create authentic and lasting brand awareness, avoid solely publishing promotional messages. Instead, focus on content that emphasizes your personality and values first.

Generate leads and sales. Whether online, in-store or directly through your social profiles, followers don’t make purchases by accident. For example, are you about alerting customers about new products and promos? Are you integrating your product catalog into

your social profiles? Are you running exclusive deals for followers? Grow your brand’s audience. Bringing new followers into the fold means finding ways to introduce your brand to folks who haven’t heard of you before. Boost community engagement. Index data shows that 46% of consumers think brands that engage their audience are best in class on social, so it pays to explore new ways to grab the attention of your current followers. This means experimenting with messaging and content.

Drive traffic to your site. Simple enough. If you’re laser-focused on generating leads or traffic to your website, social media can make it happen. Whether through promotional posts or social ads, keeping an eye on conversions and URL clicks can help you better determine your ROI from social media.

How to create a user perona

According to hootsuite, a buyer persona is a detailed description of someone who represents your target audience. This persona is fictional but based on deep research of your existing or desired audience. Buyer personas keep you focused on addressing customer priorities instead of your own. First, compile audience data from your social media analytics (especially Facebook Audience Insights), your customer database and Google Analytics to narrow in on details like:Age, Location, Language, Spending power and patterns, Interests, and Challenges. Second, identify customer goals and pain points. Your audience’s goals might be personal or professional, depending on the kinds of products and services you sell. What motivates your customers? What’s their end game? On the flip side of that are their pain points. What problems or hassles are your potential customers trying to solve? What’s holding them back from success? What barriers do they face in reaching their goals? Now that you have a grasp on your customers’ goals and struggles, it’s time to think about how you can help. That means thinking beyond just the features and analyzing the true benefits of your product or service.

Important Social media Metrics

According to sproutsocial, your social media goals are what determine your metrics. For every goal, you need a related metric, which will help determine if your social strategy is hitting the mark or not. Social media metrics are important because they prove you can measure how successful a campaign is, how well your social strategy is performing, and ultimately if you will have an impact on your overall business. Here are some important metrics to consider.

The engagement rate is a metric often used to track how actively involved with your content your audience is and how effective your brand campaigns are. Engaged consumers interact with brands through interactions such as “likes,” comments and social sharing. Frequently used but often confused, impressions and reach are each an important metric to track, especially if your goals for social are focused around brand awareness and perception.

Share of voice is a metric often used in public relations, or as part of a competitive analysis

or paid advertising campaign. It indicates how much of the online sphere your brand is taking part in. ROI which includes referrals, and conersions, is one of the most important metrics. Most applicable for companies with websites or e-commerce platforms, social referral traffic and conversions are tied to both sales and marketing goals, and ultimately major business goals. To track these, you’ll need a publishing strategy that incorporates UTM tracking and a website traffic analytics program like Google Analytics or a built-in one if you’re on an e-commerce platform like Shopify.

We’ve been pretty focused on the performance of posts and social media accounts but what about your customer’s experience with your brand? This is where metrics like response rate and response time come in. They track how fast your team is responding to important messages and how many of them are actually being responded to.

Creating Engaging content

Data from sproutsocial helps us narrow down how to create engaging content. You already know that it’s important to have a social media presence with fresh, engaging content. And you know that effective social content can drive traffic to your site and convert visitors into paying customers. Know your post anatomy.There are posts, and then there are effective posts. To publish truly effective social media content, you should understand the specific purpose and value of each element of a post. Build the perfect post. There’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all post, so we’ve collected some proven best practices to help you achieve your social media goals. Write Captions and headlines that will attract the audience’s attention. You have the choice of using a short headline, a longer caption, or both. Special characters and emoji can add interest, attract the eye, and make your brand more relatable. Try to begin or end your posts with a clear call to action. Mentioning other businesses, organizations, contributors, and influencers in social media posts is fundamental to social networking. Use hashtags to identify content, brands, themes, trends, and campaigns. Curate and re-purpose existing content. You don’t have to create all your social content from scratch! Your organization and your entire social media community are excellent content resources. Evaluating your organization’s own content as well as media from respected external sources can uncover valuable assets. You can then re-purpose or reshare these assets to help keep your audience engaged with your own brand. Know your networks. People use different social networks to accomplish different goals, and their behavior can vary significantly among social platforms. By understanding how people use each social media platform, you can adapt your strategy to suit their needs and reach more customers.

Create a specific social media calendar

Your social media content calendar also needs to account for the time you spend interacting with the audience (although you need to allow for some spontaneous engagement as well).

Set your posting schedule. Your social media content calendar lists the dates and times at which you will publish types of content on each channel. It’s the perfect place to plan all of your social media activities—from images, link sharing, and re-shares of user-generated content to blog posts and videos. It includes both your day-to-day posting and content for social media campaigns. Your calendar also ensures your posts are spaced out appropriately and published at the best times to post. Determine the right content mix. Make sure your content strategy and calendar reflect the mission statement you’ve assigned to each social profile, so that everything you post is working to support your business goals.

If you’re starting from scratch and you’re not sure what types of content to post, try the 80-20 rule: 80% of your posts should inform,educate, or entertain your audience20% can directly promote your brand. You could also try the social media content marketing rule of thirds: One-third of your content promotes your business, converts readers, and generates profit. One-third of your content shares ideas and stories from thought leaders in your industry or like-minded businesses. Onethird of your content is personal interactions with your audience. Don’t post too much or too little. If you’re starting a social media marketing strategy from scratch, you may not have figured out how often to post to each network for maximum engagement yet. Post too frequently and you risk annoying your audience. But, if you post too little, you risk looking like you’re not worth following (Hootsuite).

Social media Marketing