While most businesses know that they can grow their online presence and following by being active on social media, it’s important to note that not all posts, comments, or interactions are going to give you a positive outcome unless it’s all part of a master strategy. However, if your business doesn’t quite have a handle on social media and how to best use it to your advantage, coming up with a social media strategy might be easier said than done.
To help you uncover just what you need to be doing in order to get the maximum return on your social media investment, here are three tips for creating a social media marketing strategy.
Work From Your Goals First
When used correctly, your social media efforts can help to move you closer to your ultimate business goals. But until you know what your business goals are and in which ways social media could help you achieve those goals, you can know what you should be doing with your social media to reach those goals.
To help with this, Christina Newberry and Evan LePage, contributors to HootSuite.com, recommend creating a graph where you outline what your business objective is, what social media goal is related to that business objective, and what social media metrics will help you to know when that goal has been reached. By doing this, you’ll be able to logically see how you can reach your business goals using your social media channels.
Pick The Right Platforms
For businesses that don’t really understand how to use social media to their advantage, it might be tempting to try to be active on all social media channels in an effort to try to reach as many people as possible. However, you’ll find that working with specific platforms will prove to be much more effective for you.
When picking the right platforms, Mark Walker-Ford, a contributor to SocialMediaToday.com, advises that you try to pick the platforms that will more resonate with your target audience. By being active on those platforms, you’ll be able to reach the greatest number of people within your target audience as you work smarter, not harder.
Discover What’s Being Said About You
Many times, part of your social media strategy will involve addressing any negative comments that come your way. So to help you stay on top of this, Pierre De Braux, a contributor to Social Media Examiner, recommends that you keep track of any conversations that take place on threads for your business in addition to any mentions that get made about you. This will help you learn where you stand with your audience and assist you in making any necessary changes to your social strategy as you go along.
If you’re wanting to set up a social media strategy for your business, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you in doing this.
