There is no doubt social media is a powerful tool for marketing your business. Today, some form of social media presence is crucial if you want to appear legitimate to your audience.
Would you really trust a business that has zero presence on social media? Gone are the days when you could get away without any social media accounts.
And while you don’t have to be on all the platforms, having a presence for your business on the right platforms can go a long way.
One misconception about social media marketing is that it will solve all of your marketing problems and that social media alone can grow your business.
This often leads to disappointment when the reality sets in that social media is not as effective when it is not supported by other marketing tactics.
What is Social Media Most Effective For?
Social media marketing has a range of benefits! These benefits can include increased awareness, expanded audience reach, community engagement, driving traffic to your website and more.
You can also use social media metrics to evaluate your brand awareness (how many people know your brand exists) and customer sentiment (how people feel about your brand).
One thing that is important to note is that likes, follows and shares do not equal revenue. These kinds of KPIs (key performance indicators) are helpful, but may not directly reflect the results you are hoping for.
Understanding The Marketing Funnel
The marketing funnel is your customer’s journey with your company. There are a few different models for this, but let’s start with the following.
It goes like this:
- Awareness: Your audience is aware of your brand – this warms them up to future interactions with your content.
- Consideration: Your prospects are considering your services/products, and comparing you to your competitors. Social proof, authority-building content and UGC are excellent for this stage.
- Conversion: This is when they purchase from you.
- Loyalty: The new customers are maintained – this is where a solid retention marketing strategy comes into play.
The challenge is that social media plays the largest role in the awareness stage of the funnel, but is not exactly the best solution for say, conversions. So, the most effective approach would be to combine different marketing tactics that can support at different stages of the funnel.
Better Together
Social media has been shown to be more effective when it is combined with other marketing tactics, such as content marketing (blogs, articles, whitepapers, email campaigns), search engine optimization and paid media. This is because they each address different levels of the funnel.
Here are some ideas for how you can support your social media strategy:
- Develop customer loyalty programs
- Improve your overall sales process
- Create a content marketing strategy
- Personalize your customer experience
Think of your marketing as an ecosystem. Social media is one part of that ecosystem. In order to create a holistic marketing plan, companies need a big picture view that encapsulates a variety of marketing strategies.
What’s Best for Me? The Answer Is, It Depends.
The effectiveness of different social platforms is going to vary from industry to industry. You also want to think of your larger business goals. Do we want to increase leads? Do we want to build brand awareness? No approach is one size fits all – the solution that will bring you the best long-term results is the one that is carefully tailored to your company’s needs.
You Can Do Everything, But You Don’t Have To.
You don’t have to be using all the tactics. The best approach is to choose the most important ones that align with your business goals, and start there. This way we can stay laser focused on your goals, without overstretching or watering down your marketing. As your marketing budget and resources grow, you can add in other tactics to superpower your business.
Nioma can work with your company to create and implement powerful marketing strategies to help you grow your business, through social media marketing services and more. Reach out to learn more.
