Guest Post by Kristin Savage
Social media marketing remains one of the cornerstones of successful advertisement. With millions of people actively using platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, marketers are bound to take advantage of such a lucrative market.
According to studies, 95% of adults are more likely to follow a brand online if they see social media marketing activity with their name on it. Coupled with the fact that 34% of world’s population uses social media and the internet, the math on whether or not SMM is important is pretty clear.
However, not every company or startup has the budget necessary for paid advertisement. Luckily, social media marketing allows for a plethora of advertisement techniques with little to no costs.
Benefits of social media marketing
Before we get into the specific techniques, let’s take a look at why you should care about them at all. After all, social media marketing is only one of several effective marketing techniques. If we break down the benefits and advantages of social media marketing over others, they would look like this:
- Industry authority and recognition – Getting recognition as the de facto provider of quality content and services in your niche is important. Many brands struggle to find their footing in the digital world due to a lack of social media exposure. By introducing such a marketing methodology into your brand, you will get a cheap and easy way to build exposure, recognition and buzz around your company.
- B2C and B2B networking – Social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Behance and even Tumblr are great for networking both in B2C and B2B. Companies often use these platforms to promote their products, recruit new staff and create an online presence overall. The best thing about this type of networking is that it comes free of any cost.
- High ROI – Social media marketing is one of the cheapest and most accessible ways to market a brand. All you have to do is create dedicated pages with your brand’s name and content to get started. While paid advertisement and ranking boost is available to would-be brands, it is completely unnecessary if you play your cards right.
- Valuable data and feedback – Most importantly, social media platforms allow you to communicate directly to your customers. It takes only a few seconds to respond to someone’s worries or ask people about their thoughts and opinions in regards to your brand. You can get very valuable customer data by simply talking to your followers in a casual and non-obtrusive social media manner.
SMM strategies to consider
- Chase after trends
The name of the game in SMM is content creation. The more content you have on offer, the more likely you are to attract an audience. People love to follow pages that offer valuable insight about popular trends and up-to-date news. In that regard, it’s important to follow your industry’s trends and implement them into your content.
For example, if a new and intriguing book design concept has become popular; why not talk about it on your design agency’s page? The goal of SMM is to attract as many likeminded people to your brand as possible. That way, you will build a community of followers who can communicate among themselves even if you don’t post a piece of content now and then.
- Audience targeting and segmentation
One of the major benefits of social media marketing is the fact that you have access to literal billions of users. It’s quite easy to target individual audiences through specialized content and segment them into manageable groups. Each brand has numerous products and services attached to their name.
Just like any one person in the world, not every follower will like everything they see on your page. To that end, you can create content based on different product lines and customer profiles. Once you gather a sizeable following, you can conduct a small survey to see how many of your readers fall in each distinct category.
Believe it or not, an international audience isn’t impossibility through social media platforms. You can check Pick Writers’ translation reviews to find a professional translator for your social media content. This will allow you to create much clearer content planning strategies for the future.
- Motivational content works
Easily digestible content will always take precedent in social media channels. Some of the most popular and shareable content on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram falls into the “motivational” category. It’s quite easy to understand why – people like to see encouraging and positive messages.
You can create a content plan that focuses on motivational quotes, thoughts and life goals and complement them with mellow images. These content pieces can go alongside your logo and visual elements for added effect.
- Using Thunderclap campaigns
Thunderclap is one of the most popular and effective social media marketing techniques out there. Best of all, it is completely free to use and allows brands to reach very sizeable audiences. The secret of Thunderclap is in the fact that you can use your existing follower base to attract new customers.
Each of your followers can participate in the “thunderclap” and let you post an automated piece of content on their profile pages. This content pops up on every participating profile at the same time, effectively creating an online flash mob. The subsequent reach and conversion rates would shock even the most cynical social media marketing manager.
- Implement proper hashtags
Social media campaigns often live and die by the hashtags that accompany them. While Instagram gave birth to the trend of implementing hashtags, platforms such as Tumblr and Facebook have fully embraced them in the meantime. Make sure to use easy-to-memorize and relatable hashtags in your social media marketing content. All you have to do is type a hash and follow it up with a word or a phrase you want to associate with.
If chosen correctly, it will help you reach an audience which likes to see content related to that tag. Use as many hashtags and in as many content pieces as you want. Just make sure that you use the ones related to your brand, industry and niche.
- Consider using memes
Memes are a very popular and trending topic on social media platforms. In short, memes often represent witty commentary written across an image from a popular movie or a TV show. Memes are a great way to approach younger audience or anyone who is remotely familiar with the content included.
Memes are great in social media marketing because of their cheap entry price (at zero cost) and the humor that accompanies them. Very few people are able to resist the urge to comment or share a funny meme with their friends or colleagues. It makes sense to brand your custom memes with brand-specific content in order to gain more exposure and buzz as a result.
- Use calls to action
Lastly, one of the most important elements to any content marketing strategy is to include calls to action. CTAs revolve around literal “requests” from the viewers, allowing you to provoke a response from your followers. Calls to action can include anything from purchase requests, friend recommendations or comments on the content itself.
Use calls to action in order to create activity surrounding your content and make sure that people involve in it. This is the best way to start building a community around your brand at zero costs. All it really takes is to write creative CTAs and not be afraid to ask your followers to speak their minds. They wouldn’t expect anything less from a prolific brand such as yours.
Conclusion
As you can see, you don’t need a six-figure budget to start a successful social media marketing campaign. Creativity and professionalism go a long way when it comes to online marketing, especially through social media platforms.
Make sure to try different techniques before settling for the one (or several) that works. It will help you figure out which content types you are good at and how involved you would like to be with your day-to-day social media management. In the end, all that matters is that your brand’s presence grows organically and without any artificial (i.e. paid) advertisement.
Author Bio
Kristin Savage nourishes, sparks and empowers using the magic of a word. Along with pursuing her degree in Creative Writing, Kristin was gaining experience in the publishing industry, with expertise in marketing strategy for publishers and authors. Now she had found herself as a freelance writer. She observes with a special interest how the latest achievements in media and technology help to grow readership and revenue and shares her opinion. You can find her on Facebook and Twitter.
