Facebook. Twitter. Instagram. TikTok.

Besides being social media platforms, what do all these sites have in common?

Well, their apps garnered over 20 million downloads in 2020.

With more people downloading these social media apps, more people are spending time scrolling through their feeds to get the latest information. With the average user spending over two hours a day on social media, it’s a great place to connect with prospects.

But how do you reach these prospects effectively? That’s where social media marketing can help.

In this ultimate guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know about social media marketing. We’ll answer questions like:

• What is social media marketing?
• Why should I use social media marketing?
• How do I set up a successful social media strategy?
• What are some tips for using social media for marketing?

Keep reading to learn more about this strategy, and feel free to subscribe to our email newsletter for the latest tips and tricks for marketing your business!

What is social media marketing?

Social media marketing is a form of Internet marketing where you create and share content through social media platforms. This strategy enables you to engage with prospects to increase brand recognition, leads, and sales for your business.

Why use social media marketing?

Now that we’ve answered, “What is social media marketing,” it’s time to answer the next most common question: Why use it?

Here are four reasons to build a social media marketing strategy for your business:

Social media marketing helps you build brand recognition

Using social media for marketing enables you to build brand recognition with your audience. When you have a direct connection to your audience, you have an opportunity to showcase your brand in front of your followers.

You can share content that helps your audience get to know your business. From your company background to your products to announcements, you can share content to help people get more familiar with your company.

 

 

Brand familiarity is a crucial component to helping your business succeed down the line. When people are familiar with your business, they feel more comfortable purchasing from your company.

Social media marketing helps you increase traffic to your site

One of the most significant benefits of developing a social media marketing strategy is that it enables you to increase traffic to your site. When you share content on your social profiles, that content often ties back to your site.

As a result, the people who click on your social posts will visit your website, which increases traffic to your site.

 

 

Not to mention, it leads to increasing relevant traffic to your site. The people who interact with your social posts have already shown an interest in your business, either by looking you up or following your page. So, when these prospects click on your social content and visit your site, you’re driving valuable traffic for your company.

Social media marketing helps create a line of communication with prospects

One of the most significant benefits of using social media for marketing is that you have a line of communication with prospects. Social media marketing is one of the few strategies to connect directly with people interested in your business, but it’s valuable to your business.

When you have a line of communication with prospects, you can help nudge them towards choosing your business. You can provide them with helpful information they’re missing or solve any issues they’re having with your business.

As a result, you create better relationships with your prospects, helping you turn them into customers for your company.

Social media marketing helps increase conversions

Social media marketing for businesses will help you earn more conversions for your business. When you build relationships with your prospects, they feel more comfortable buying from your company. Not to mention, if all their interactions with your business are positive, they’re more inclined to choose you.

These social platforms are an excellent place for you to share the latest sales and deals, encouraging prospects to shop.

 

 

How to set up your social media marketing strategy for success

Before you launch your first social post, there are a few things you must establish to ensure you’re successful with your strategy.

Here’s how you can set your social media marketing strategy up for success:

Identify your target audience

When you learn how to do social media marketing, one of the first things you learn is to identify your target audience. You won’t succeed with your strategy if you aren’t targeting the right people, so you must identify who’s most interested in your business.

To determine your target audience, look at the typical customer that frequents your business. Determine information like:

• Age
• Gender
• Location
• Occupation
• Income
• Hobbies
• Interests

You can use this information to form buyer personas, which help you understand who you’re targeting on social media.

When you compile this information, you can determine which social media platforms are best for your business. You can focus on platforms where your target audience is likely to spend their time.

Identify your platforms

Once you know who you’re targeting, the next step is to identify your platforms. You want to use social platforms your audience is likely to use so that you can reach them.

There are dozens of platforms you can choose from, including:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• Pinterest
• LinkedIn
• YouTube
• Snapchat
• TikTok

Set your goals

Before you start using social media for marketing, you must determine the goal of your social media strategy. What do you want to achieve through social media?

You can choose from numerous goals, including:

• Increase brand recognition
• Increase engagement
• Increase leads
• Increase sales

Without goals, you’ll post on social media aimlessly. Goals help you keep your social content focused so that you can drive results.

Determine how you want to convey your brand

One of the biggest benefits of social media is that it enables you to convey your brand’s personality through posts. Before you launch your first post, you need to determine your brand identity.

You want to determine how you’ll convey your brand to your audience.

Do you want to take a fun-loving and casual approach like Target?

 

 

What about a comical and quirky approach like Dollar Shave Club?

 

 

That’s what you need to figure out with your social media identity. You need to determine your brand’s personality and how you want to convey that personality to your audience.

Identify the metrics you want to track

When you learn how to do social media marketing, you learn that tracking your campaigns’ success is critical. You need to see how your content performs, so you can continually optimize your strategy to drive better results.

You’ll want to identify your key performance metrics (KPIs) to track your campaigns’ performance. Your social media KPIs will depend upon your campaign goals, but some standard metrics to track include:

• Engagement
• Website traffic
• Brand awareness
• Post reach
• Clickthrough rate (CTR)
• Bounce rate
• Conversions

3 quick tips on how to do social media marketing successfully

Now that you have the necessary components for launching a successful social media campaign, you can start posting! To help you get the most from sharing content on social media, follow these three social media marketing tips:

Use a social media content calendar to stay organized

When you do social media marketing for businesses, you must post content often. Your audience follows dozens of friends, family, and companies, so it’s easy for your content to get lost in the mix. Posting frequently, though, helps you reach these prospects.

Since you must post content often, you must stay organized. A social media content calendar can help you plan out when you’re posting content and where, so you can create a most cohesive strategy for your business.

When you create a social media content calendar, only plan content for the month. If you plan too far in advance, you may have to change it later as things change with your business and industry.

P.S. To make posting easy, consider using a social scheduling tool like Hootsuite or Buffer. It enables you to schedule your content in advance, so you don’t have to spend time each day posting. Using a social scheduling tool with your social media calendar is a one-two punch that gives you an advantage with your marketing.

Post at the right time

If you want to succeed with social media marketing for businesses, you must post your content at the right time. You want to ensure that your audience sees your content when you post it and doesn’t get lost in their feeds.

For example, if you’re posting your content at 9 a.m., but your audience interacts on your social platform between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m., you’re going to miss them.

That’s why you need to know your target audience — when you know who you’re targeting, you can figure out when they’re likely to engage on social platforms. As a result, you get your content in front of more prospects, which leads to increased engagement.

Continually assess your campaigns

No campaign is perfect. You may think you have one of the best social media campaigns ever, but your audience may tell you otherwise. If you want to use social media for marketing, you must continually monitor and assess your campaigns.

You can use some of the KPIs we listed above to help you track your campaign.

If you see that certain parts of your social strategy are underperforming, you can use it as an opportunity to optimize and improve your strategy.

What is social media marketing? Your key to online growth

Using social media for marketing is a great way to help your business grow online. But if you’re busy running your business and don’t have the time to optimize your campaign, WebFX is here to help. We have a team of over 300 marketing experts that can help you launch a successful social media strategy.

We build custom campaigns that drive results. In the past five years alone, we’ve driven over $2.4 billion in sales and over 6.3 million leads. We can drive results for your business, too.

Ready to grow your business through social media? Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist about our social media marketing services!