The biggest benefit of using social media for your business is that you have an opportunity to reach millions of people. Your audience can grow exponentially when you make the move to a digital strategy. There is a difference however between being on social media and utilizing social media to grow your business. Any Joe Shmo can post a few cute videos and easy promo graphics online. It takes more to really be effective. Here is the secret to building brand awareness on social.
Get in Front of the Right Audience
This starts of course with actually knowing who your audience is. Who are you seeing day in and day out buying from your brick and mortar or ordering your product online? This is step one to expanding brand awareness. Stay open-minded! Who you see buying in stores may not be the same buyer online. Once you have a good grasp on who your demographic is, you need to get your pages, content, and product in front of them. You can use paid or unpaid (organic) efforts online. Facebook is a business, so it runs better for you and gives you more reach when you back your content with an ad budget. Makes sense, right? There are a few ways you can get your posts in front of more eyeballs: Facebook Ads, Boosted Posts, and Shared Content.
Before you start throwing money at Facebook, do a little research into the difference between ads and boosted posts, and delve into your industry on social to see what pages you should be sharing and using to link. The most important aspect of a paid ad is knowing your target.
Create Consumable Content
Getting your content in front of the right people is only effective if that content is quality. Creating your content should take a bit of time and effort; it should not just be thrown together. The age of the internet has created an age of impatience and high expectation; there is some incredible content out there. You should create content with a purpose. You may know who your audience is, but you may have to test out various types of content to see what they like.
Your social media platforms are great testing grounds for your content. Don’t expect leads or sales the minute you start posting. What you get immediately is data, that you can use to shape your content. Are your third-party shares getting the most likes and comments? Then keep sharing, but use those topics to inspire your own, original content. Don’t copy what everyone else in your industry is doing. Take what they are creating and make it better. Ask yourself if and what the benefit is for your audience. Why are they following you and what are you giving them? A good rule of thumb for consistent quality content is to post 10% promotional, 50% original, and 40% curated content.
To know more about using social media for small business, see our blog!
