If you go to any B-school throughout the world you would be taught that if you are a manufacturer, your work won’t end up by just producing or assembling the end product but you have to search for different ways through which you could persuade your potential customers to buy products.
This process is called Marketing.
In the last century, we have seen different means of marketing used by companies & brands to promote their product i.e. advertising of Newspapers, Televisions & Radio, Hoardings, Posters & Banners. Billions of dollars are being spent on these methods but none can guarantee you that advertisement will reach potential customers.
Here comes the Social Media.
Before I should tell you how you can do social media marketing let us see some amazing facts about social media.
- The world’s population is 7.7 billion till 2019, at the same time there are 3.4 billion users on different social media sites.
- Social media users grew by 202 million between April 2018 and April 2019.
- The average daily time spent on social is 142 minutes a day
- 91% of retail brands use 2 or more social media channels
- 81% of all small and medium businesses use some kind of social platform
These numbers show the real strength of social media. Social sites like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter & many more started as a platform for distant people to interact but today these platforms are widely used by marketers for brand awareness & promotional means. For new business startups, social media marketing is the key to their ultimate success.
Firstly let us discuss the advantages of using social media marketing than any of the traditional marketing techniques: –
- Cost-effective: – If you advertise on Print (Newspaper) or Digital media (Television, Radio) then you have to pay a lot of bucks but when it comes to social media marketing you can promote your products either paying some charge to website for displaying your post or you can go for free as well.
- Result-oriented:- On social media sites you can control who is going to see your post which is not in the case of other traditional techniques. Social sites allow you to select your potential customer base through their interest, behavior & demographics.
- Brand Recognition: – Many national or international brands are today using social media to get the recognition of their brand within youngsters. Luxury brands are investing heavily to promote their brand only as it gives them easy reach to their prospective customers in a more cost-friendly way.
- Easy to get Customer response: – how could you get feedback about your product or services on traditional marketing methods, it is near to impossible but when it comes to social media the impossibility turns into opportunity. You can engage in conversation with your customers on social media & can reward them for better reviews or feedback on your products. This can help in increasing brand loyalty.
- Faster than SEO strategy: – yes, SEO is free & you can get genuine leads from it but you can’t get it in just one magic wand. You have to put a great number of efforts & time on SEO strategy. In the festive seasons, you can’t depend on SEO for getting sales through lead conversions. The reason is SEO shows a slow impact & you need the patience to get desired results.
So these are just some of the major advantages of using social media for promoting your brand. Now let us see how you can start doing social media marketing in the best possible way.
Remember that you can’t get a better result by approaching with just one social media site. You have to start on different social sites i.e. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram & WhatsApp.
- Initiate with a Marketing Plan: – No business can sustain without the proper planning. Your social media marketing plan must consist of how many different social sites you are targeting? , how you will approach each site? & what would be your strategy to get a higher response from the audience? It should be a guide through which you can formulate daily activities on all different sites without any diversions from your basic objective of marketing.
- Start with a Business Page: – As every business needs a logo, trademark or tagline, similarly it needs a page or account on social media where you can share all posts, details & information with users. A business page gives authenticity to your customers. They can follow your page if they need to get regular posts regarding your brand. You also start with having a group on social sites where you could engage with users.
- Brand Awareness should be priority:- if you need that all those who follow you on your business page should remain there for quite a long time then I would say that you must give priority to brand awareness posting rather than direct sales pitching. First, let them know you & your product & then go for convincing them for sales.
- Do original & well-researched posting: – Try to be different in your approach to your customers & this can only be achieved through emphasizing only on those content-rich posting. This increases engagement on your posts & make your page worth following.
- Take services like SMM panel:- SMM panel is becoming a popular tool for social media marketing. If you are just a beginner in this field then you could buy Facebook likes, Instagram followers, YouTube subscribers & many more to give a boost to your early posts.
- Contact to Influence Marketers: – Influence Marketers are those social media page owners who have thousands of followers. If you want to get visibility of your posts then you have to pay some fee & they will put your post on their page.
- Try to be regular: – Many social marketers have an unacceptable habit of being irregular in their postings. Once you have followers on your page & if they won’t find your newer posts frequently then you might lose their interest in your business page or your offerings.
In the end, I would say that yes social media marketing is not a cup of tea but once you indulge yourself in it then you would get more & more response for your products & services.
