Social media marketing is an effective means of getting the word out about your products and/or services. But, many times it’s clear that a small business is not doing all that it can do when it comes to using social media marketing to its full advantage. You might think social media marketing ends at sharing a few posts each day. But nothing could be further from the truth!

How to Get More Out of Your Social Media Marketing

 

Create Consistent and Complete Profiles

This is so obvious that it’s often overlooked! No matter which social media you’ve determined is important to use for your niche, it’s imperative that you create consistent and complete social media profiles. Include a professional headshot, and keep the text description of your profiles similar. This helps to ensure that one profile doesn’t contradict the other. You want visitors to know who you are immediately without having to guess.

Host Live Events

With services like Google Hangouts and Facebook Live, you can host live events such as a round table that is open to the public to watch, while your group discusses a hot topic within your niche. Another way to have a “live” event is to host a Twitter party, or a Facebook party where everyone is allowed to post links to their own business or blogs for a specific amount of time. One way to do this is ask everyone to write a blog post about a specific topic and link to it within 24 hours, share and use a specific hashtag to promote the event.

Congratulate People

If you notice anyone having a special day on any of your social media accounts, be sure to congratulate them and wish them well. It’s a good chance to make a connection with someone whom you’re friends with or connected with that you don’t necessarily know well.

While a lot of people may be doing the same thing, people still like to be noticed for their achievements, accomplishments and special days. If you know their address, it’s a good idea to also drop a card in the mail to make it even more special.

If you want to take it a step further, here’s a neat idea for an ecommerce brand – when you see it’s someone’s birthday, DM them a coupon code good for 2-5 days as a happy birthday gift!

Use More Images

People who use social media prefer sharing and engaging with images over text. You should always include text with the images, though (for the sake of keywords). However, creating images and memes using software like Pixlr or an app like Word Swag is simple, fun and easy. If you’re only using text-based posts, you will notice an immediate uptick in your engagement. You can post something as simple as a quote on a cool background and see a huge difference in the amount of engagement from your connections.

Of course video content is always hot on social media. The key to using video for your business is to make video fun and informative! From 60 second clips to 5 minute tutorials, creating your own videos will undoubtedly boost your social media marketing results. You can upload videos directly to the social media platform, as opposed to simple sharing from YouTube. The social media platforms typically reward native uploads with greater visibility.

Related Article: A Beginner’s Guide to Content Marketing Using Video

Use Social Media to Survey Your Audience

A great way to get more engagement is to survey your audience. Find out what they really need and want, but don’t give them too many choices. It should be more like when you get your child ready for school – give them two choices: this or that? Give your audience a choice between two different videos you can create or webinars that you will host. Then, ask them to vote or decide.

You aren’t limited to using “real” surveys that will help you bring forth the products and services your audience wants. You can also have fun with surveys! From simple polls to quick yes/no type posts, fans love to answer questions and share their opinions. So while you’re queuing up the “real” surveys, don’t be afraid to throw some fun surveys in the mix. From the “coffee or tea” questions, to “what are you watching on Netflix” – everybody has something to share.

Related Article: The Best Online Poll Apps and Social Media Polls

Capture Influencers’ Attention

This can be tricky, but you want to find a way to call out influencers within your niche. If you can get a popular “guru” or authority within your niche to like, share, and connect with you, it’s possible to quickly expand your audience. There are many different ways to do this. One is to post a thoughtful comments on their posts, and share with your audience what the influencer is doing.

Get Engaged

Finally, to get more out of social media marketing it’s important to be truly engaged. Don’t put everything on autopilot. Make intelligent and purposeful comments and share freely. You’ll get more results out of your social media marketing than if you simply automated it all. And let’s face it, many companies are putting their entire social effort on automate. You can easily position your brand as the better alternative and grow your business by adding a human touch to your interactions. Go forth and engage!

Ciao,
Miss Kemya