SME believes in the model that when you "Fail to plan you are planning to fail," especially when it comes to your social media marketing plan. Having a solid, goal-oriented social media strategy is just as important as having your sound business plan. If your plan is just to wing it, your fans are going to know it, potentially leading them to your competitors.
When creating your social media marketing plan there are at least 10 questions you should ask yourself before you begin. These will help you better engage your fans and ideally convert them into customers.
1. What should my company aim to achieve with social media?
This will depend on the type of business you are in. One of your objectives may be to use social media to gain exposure for your brand, to directly interact with your customers or to promote specific products and services. Either way your most important step here is to clearly identify your goals. After you have done this, you want to understand your customer's goals and find a way to use your social-media strategy to connect both. Think about how you can use social media to solve your customer's problems.
2. What are the best social networks for small businesses?
Whether you have a large company or a small business, you can't go wrong with Twitter. Twitter is easy to learn and very user friendly, and it's only 140 character limit! Google+ is important to be on, if only to boost your search engine optimization (SEO). If your company is mainly a B2B firm, you'll want to be on LinkedIn to reach influencers in your industry and for B2C companies, being on Facebook and Pinterest may be applicable.
3. What types of content should I post on which social platforms?
On Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram and Google+ visuals are striking to viewers. Posting images of company events, behind the scenes snapshots of employees and memorable images of your products are effective. Text-only status updates also trend well on Facebook and do not necessarily need an accompany link, especially when asking questions.
On Twitter, it is good to have a good balance of tweeting about your company, and retweeting others' content, including that of your business partners and industry influencers. LinkedIn is also popular for sharing company news, productivity tips and thought leadership articles.
Always keep your social media platforms fresh and interesting by using a diverse mix of content, photos, video, useful links, helpful tips, question, etc.
4. How can I convert social-media followers into customers?
Consistently link your website to your social media posts when applicable. This will drive your customers to your website, creating that much more traffic and ultimately increasing your bottom line. You should also utilize cross-platform strategies, such as a contest that integrates several social channels. An example would be tweeting a description of a contest found on your Facebook page with a link to the rules and an entry form found on your website. The key here is to have everything uniform and utilize all platforms in a way to creates interest and buzz, constantly making sure you are driving your customers to your website - herein lies where you will convert those followers into customers.
5. How can I measure the success of my social-media marketing efforts?
Some social media platforms offer their own metrics. Facebook, gives Page Administrators access to Page Insights data for free. These metrics tell you how many people are interacting with your posts. You can use this data to better plan future posts and decide on the most effective ways to connect with your fans. LinkedIn provides similar analytics for company pages.
You can use Google Analytics to see how effective your social-media campaigns are at driving traffic to your main website. If you see Twitter, Facebook, or other social platforms you are active on as your top referrers to your site, your social-media efforts are key to your success!
