Social Media Marketing: it hurts but it works.

It’s nice to pretend you don’t need a social media marketing strategy. Thinking about goals is a pain in the neck.

But let’s face it; your business needs some big-picture planning. The good news is that a little goes a long way.

Creating a simple social media strategy will help your target audience get to know and buy from your business. It’ll also save you time. Ditching scattergun social media posting for a well-thought-out plan will kill that Friday night panic that you’ve got nothing scheduled on Facebook.

Drawing up your social media marketing strategy can be fun. It’s an opportunity to sit back, congratulate yourself on what you’re doing well, and examine what you could be doing better.

A SIMPLE SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING STRATEGY in 5 STEPS

1. GOALS

What do you want your social media marketing to do? 

– Increase brand recognition

– Boost engagement

– Sell a particular product or service

– Bring more people to your website?

2. AUDIENCE

Who is your target audience? Do you know who they are, where they live, and what they like? What social media platforms do they frequent? Drawing up an ideal customer profile will help you get inside the head of your target audience. 

3. PLATFORMS

Not every social media platform will be relevant to your business. Your ideal customer profile will inform you which platforms will help you meet your goals. There’s no point posting on LinkedIn if you’re selling mobility aids. 

I recommend checking out your competitors’ content, not to steal it, obviously, but to find out where they post, how often they publish content and the levels of engagement they receive.

4. CONTENT

With defined goals, you can confidently create engaging, relevant content in advance using a simple content calendar and some cracking graphics. I use Hootsuite to schedule client social media content, and while expensive, it has recently added a ton of extra valuable features. 

To successfully build brand recognition, your brand tone of voice, ethos and colour palette should feature throughout your content. 

5. TRACKING PROGRESS

Metrics help you measure the success of your social media strategy. If something isn’t working, you can change it. Thankfully, most social media channels provide their own analytics.

Track:

– Engagement (likes, comments, shares, retweets, clicks etc.)

– Reach (impressions, traffic to website etc.)

– Leads (does your content generate leads and purchases?)

– Followers (which platforms attract the most new followers?)

 

NEED HELP WITH YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING STRATEGY? 

Get in touch for a chat – https://shipshapecopywriting.com/services