Social media is a great way for any business to build awareness of its brand, to drive traffic to its website and to generate new leads, but be warned…
Any business signing up to a social media platform must be prepared to entertain and contribute value. Launching into a hard and fast marketing campaign as soon as you have gained a few ‘Likes’ or ‘Followers’ will see them all disappear quicker than a rat up a drainpipe!
Firstly, find and research your target audience, talk to them and keep them keen with interesting information, original tips, ideas, ‘how-to’ articles and blogs. Secondly, identifying online conversations is a perfect opportunity to contribute useful comments, while at the same time building trust and confidence in your business alongside an ‘identity’ to which people can relate and direct questions to. These are also very effective ways for your business to stand out from its competitors.
The third thing is to consider the social media platforms you will use. A good start is to see which ones your competitors are using and join too! Of course, you may also see this as an opportunity to use a platform that isn’t saturated with competition…
Once you have selected and registered with your chosen platforms the next step is to identify how you will find and get to know your audience and, importantly, the type of content you will be posting. Researching keywords to see what is being talked about and shared the most is also a great way of establishing what your audience actually enjoys…
Next, don’t forget to ‘blog!’ Work out what your business is going to blog about, who is going to write them and how often – and remember to post a link to your blog from your social media platforms. This way, traffic will be driven to your website from people looking to read your business’ blog!
And last, but not least...
Just because you have hundreds (or thousands!) of followers on Twitter and Facebook doesn’t mean you should neglect your business website. As a matter of fact, the more followers you have on social media the more ‘traffic’ that is likely to be driven to your website, so ensuring it looks smart and fresh, has great content, is responsive, regularly updated and easy to use increases the likelihood of repeat visitors, and ultimately new clients.
All sounds easy, eh?
If you would like some help or advice about social media or would like to discuss having a new website, contact us and we will be more than happy to help.