Social Media Marketing Explained

According to wikipedia “Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service.[1] Most of these social media platforms have their own built-in data analytics tools, which enable companies to track the progress, success, and engagement of ad campaigns.”

The idea of social media marketing is pretty straight-forward, however, executing a proper campaign can be difficult. There are multiple social media platforms businesses can share news, products, and updates on, and each platform performs differently.

Build a Plan

What are your goals for your campaign? Do you want to bring in more followers? Increase engagement on your landing pages? Increase conversions through social media? These are the questions you need to ask before starting a campaign.

Finding your audience can be one of the most difficult parts of social media marketing (SMM). Who is your audience, where are they browsing information, what do they want to see? These are the questions you need to ask before building your campaign. You’ll find your audience may be more relevant on certain social media sites compared to others.

Create Some Excellent Content

You’ll need something compelling to share with your followers, and to build more followers. The content you are sharing on your accounts can vary from videos, images, and articles. The point is to make them intriguing, helpful, and entertaining to your readers. Answer questions with your content, find out what people are asking and share the solutions. Have a item or product that was just released? Let your followers know, you can even give them a sneak-peek of new items that are coming out in the future.

Be Consistent with Your Posting

You’ve got your accounts set up, got a few followers, and even made a post or two. Now this is when businesses stop posting to social media. Businesses need to be consistent with their postings. Don’t become inactive on social media just because a post didn’t have much engagement. Continue to post your items and content.

There have been multiple studies on when to post to social media, and HubSpot has done a complete guide on when to post to social media. Test different times of day and days of the week to see where the most engagement happens. You may find users are more active at certain times of the day than others.

Compare the Competition

Checkout your competitor’s social media accounts to see how they are engaging followers. You may find they are using different tactics that have been successful. You may find certain users or sites are engaging with their content/posts. Share your content with these users to build a following and increase your shares.

Track Your Campaign

You have a well planned out campaign and have been posting regularly, now find out how it’s working out for you. It;s important to track your progress to determine what tactics are working and what is not. Use Google Analytics to measure traffic and conversions through social media. Many social media platforms have their own analytics which allow admins to monitor engagement on their account. Track and compare your findings, it can be very helpful data.

Find Your Platforms

There are many social media platforms out there and some are much more popular than others. Some are more applicable to certain industries, however, this doesn’t mean sites should ignore them. Some of the most popular platforms include,

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• Pinterest
• Google+
• LinkedIN
• YouTube

Social bookmarking sites worth submitting to.

• Reddit
• StumbleUpon
• Digg

These are just a few, you will find there’s a social bookmarking site for just about every industry. Find the one in your niche, create an account, and begin engaging with users. Show others you’re an expert in the industry, getting them to come to you with questions.