Social Media Marketing

Social media has become a basic form of communication for people of all ages. In today’s online world, a strategic social media marketing plan is a requirement for virtually every type of business. If a potential customer can’t easily find your website or your social media accounts, you don’t exist for them. In 2017, your business needs to be on Facebook and Twitter just like it needs a telephone number.

Social media allows you to promote your services and products, build your brand’s image, strengthen your domain authority, and attract a continual stream of prospects. An effective social media marketing plan nurtures connections between your business and your customers. Social media for your business should be focused on customer engagement. When you find out what your customers are interested in, what they are concerned about, and then provide them with useful information and content, they are much more likely to engage with your business. By using social media to talk to them, not at them, and most importantly, listen and respond to their issues and concerns, you have the opportunity to build a lasting relationship.

Simply having a business Facebook or Twitter account isn’t enough. Social media won’t work for your business without valuable, consistent, and compelling content creation and distribution. Content is core to all of your social media endeavors. Content is what gets your brand story out and engages your target audience.

What Social Media Platforms Should You Target?

There are a variety of social media platforms that almost every business owner should be using:

• Facebook: With about 2 billion users world-wide, Facebook is easily the leading social media site. Facebook reaches users across all demographics and easily relates to B2C as well as B2B businesses. Facebook has a number of features that allow businesses to connect with customers in engaging ways. Although it takes time to build an active, engaged group of followers, Facebook is an excellent way to connect with both new and returning customers.
• Twitter: The popularity of Twitter continues to grow at an amazing rate. If your customers are on Twitter, you can instantly share what’s new – whether it’s a special deal, the announcement of a new product or service, or an upcoming event. Twitter provides small businesses with a quick and easy way to spread news about their brand.
• Instagram: If you have a smart phone, you can use Instagram. The popularity of Instagram has exploded and provides an effective way to promote your business. This visually-driven social media platform provides a great way to build brand awareness and develop relationships with both new and returning customers.
• Pinterest: Another visual platform, Pinterest allows users to “pin” photos or videos onto virtual pin boards sorted by categories. Every pin can contain a link back to its source making Pinterest a powerful source of referral traffic.
• LinkedIn: Not just for job hunters, this professional networking site builds connections and works well in conjunction with other social media platforms. LinkedIn receives about 106 million unique visiting members each month, making it one of the top 4 social media networks in the US. If your target market is business-to-business, rather than business-to-consumer, then having a professional LinkedIn presence is critical.
• Blogs: Blogs are an effective way to offer new and interesting content pertaining to your services or products and are great for search engine optimization. Well-written blogs help establish your brand as an industry leader. Blogs help build trust with customers by providing useful information they can easily access and share with friends. In addition, each blog post is another web page that can be indexed and ranked for search.

The challenge for business owners is that social media changes quickly. Social media has become so popular that developing a social media advertising strategy is important for most businesses. Staying current on social media platforms and their unique specifications can be difficult unless you have the expertise and time to devote to it. Understanding the new requirements, features and restrictions of each platform is necessary in order to keep your social media marketing plan on track.

Bigger businesses can afford to have marketing staff dedicated to establishing and monitoring their social media presence. But for small business owners, it’s not that easy. Small and mid-sized businesses typically have limited personnel who can focus on establishing and maintaining a successful social media campaign. Kalamazoo SEO for Growth helps businesses of all sizes implement an effective social media marketing plan.

Our Social Media Marketing Services Can Help You Generate Website Traffic By:

• Ensuring your social media messaging aligns with your brand.
• Linking your website and social media accounts.
• Creating and sharing videos and photos featuring your company’s best attributes.
• Using social media to promote your company’s educational content.
• Increasing brand awareness.
• Improving the know, like, trust phase of your customer’s journey.
• Building engaged followers.
• Increasing social signals to improve search engine optimization (SEO).

Are you ready to get social? You probably realize your business can’t live without it but you may not know how to develop a social media plan that works for your business. Kalamazoo SEO for Growth offers a wide range of services specifically for social media marketing campaigns. Click us to learn more.