Successful Social Media Marketing Requires Strategy

No one can deny that social media is one of the best ways to market your business to the world. Unfortunately, chances are good that your competitors probably know this as well.

So, how do you find your way through the tangle of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and all the other social media platforms that are out there? It takes a lot of strategic planning to become a major player in the social media marketing world.

Follow these tips and tricks and you will be well on your way to crafting a successful social campaign:

Be Willing to Invest the Time

Rome wasn’t built in a day and the Internet will not be conquered overnight. If you truly wish to master marketing towards social media, then it is going to take a long-term commitment. Most would say that it takes about a year to create a social media profile that is substantive enough to get noticed. (Some would claim less, but only the truly spectacular campaigns can roll this out in six to nine months.)

So in order to be a success, you have to mentally prepare yourself for the investment that this requires. Here are some tips to get started:

Set SMART Goals

It’s great to have lofty goals, but are they SMART ones? This means they have to be:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Attainable
• Relevant
• Time-bound

Establish these goals to determine how often you will post new content and what you hope to gain from these posts. Make sure that everyone on the marketing team is aware of and agrees with the goals and is willing to help move this forward.

Don’t Just Promote Yourself

If all your social media feed is a list of promotions and sales, you might as well just post everything under #PleaseBuyFromUs and just pray that it all works out. Instead, you should engage with your followers as these are the customers that you are trying to connect with. Interact with their comments and posts, and show an interest in the things that they like. You also need to let your personality come through as well. Joke (tastefully) and have fun. You are more than likely going to bring in new followers and friends (and ultimately, customers).

Don’t Overdo It

No, we don’t mean post too much – that’s not really a thing. But we do think that you will burn yourself out if you try to cover every platform on the market. Start with just two platforms—most likely Facebook and then either Twitter or Instagram. When you get the hang of running the plan with these two, then you can expand to include another of the “big three” or else a smaller market platform like Tumblr.

Track Your Competition

Another way to find success is by watching your competition very closely. No, we don’t mean follow their every move and do exactly what they do. But look for trends in their postings and, if possible, anticipate what they are going to do. If you can do that, then you can beat them to the punch and it will look like they are copying you!

Audit

Don’t be afraid of this word — we don’t mean call in the IRS. But after about twelve months, it is time to reassess what you have been doing and to see if it needs to be tweaked. By doing this, you can assure that you keep your plan and program fresh; you can even get some outside advice to see what someone else has to say about your campaign.

The good news is that once you have a good plan in place, it is much easier to keep it rolling by creating new content. This doesn’t mean you can completely abandon your social media plan, though. A campaign such as this can work for you for years, but it requires constant diligence and work to truly be a success.

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