Let us look at answering a common question directed at social media, “How can Social Media help my business grow”?
There are some important points to consider first before involving yourself in to working out how social media can help improve your business profile online.
- Social Media needs to bring your business closer to your target audience, in other words humanize it more for people to engage with.
- If your business is present on social media then you are able to monitor all feedback and comments towards it, you are also able to research and monitor your brands reputation in real time with live audiences.
- With an active target audience you can also build your customer loyalty. You are able to deliver high standards of customer service and deal with feedback and complaints in real time.
- By positioning yourself on social media you are able to build your profile to ‘guru’ or ‘industry expert’ level by delivering regular educational, entertaining and engaging content.
- You can also build further relationships within your industry. Not only are potential and existing customers on social media, but those businesses which can compliment your own who you can communicate with and form stronger relationships with.
- Finally we have the SEO value that social media can present to your business. With recent changes to Google’s algorithms pushing more towards your social media presence than older traditional methods such as back linking and direct keywords, you have a great chance to increase your ranking from active social media presence.
It’s easier to get social media wrong the right and not difficult to waste valuable time and money on a campaign that has no aim or direction. There are more failure stories than success stories on social media marketing and there are more and more so called ‘social media gurus’ or digital marketing agencies starting up with no knowledge of the industry yet charging high prices for management. It is confusing unless you are able to adopt the core approach strategy to increase your chances of success across each of the platforms. You can spend hours on social media and become highly frustrated if your efforts are not rewarded.
Small businesses really need to embrace some kind of social media marketing strategy. It offers a free if not one of the most affordable ways to reach a wide span of active and real time prospective customers. Social media also improves your SEO so the more active you are on your various social media channels, the more likely your business will be found online!