10 Benefits Social Media For Your Business

WHAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING?

Social media marketing is seen by some businesses as an essential tool. A new, but powerful method of connecting with a worldwide audience/ customer base.

However to others its just another buzzword. A waste of time that doesn’t produce real, tangible results.

Well, I’m the former and will convert you into a social media marketer with these 10 points:

1. INCREASING YOUR BRANDS INFLUENCE –

The potential customer base online is larger than you can imagine. Facebook has nearly 2 billion active users, Instagram has 1 billion and Twitter has 336 million. These people are not just statistics!

They are potential customers for you and you need to be putting them to use.

Even if they don’t use your services at first if they see it, you will leave an impression, because they will remember your logo and name.

So why restrict yourself to your local area or some search terms on Google, when you can reach millions.

Start by having employees and friends sharing posts. Every share increases your influence to another circle of people.

A great example of this is Boho Exotic Studio. They are a company that sells hair extensions. They started an Instagram account to show off their hair extensions on their models. Through their Instagram growth strategies, they ended up growing a large fan base of potential customers.

And believe it or not she made over a million dollars that year due to the increase of potential customers from her Instagram account and her ability to convert them.

I have even tried to implement Instagram into my own social media strategy. Working on a game is great however you can make the best product in the world but if no one sees it, it won’t sell.

Personally, I don’t believe advertising after it is made is effective or enough unless you are willing to through a lot of money about. So why not build up a customer base before it comes out?

On my own Instagram account, I need to work on a lot, but at the very least I am building a following for not only my game. My brand now has a lot more followers invested in me as a person. Which, has also increased traffic and subscribers to my game development blog on Youtube.

2. MORE TRAFFIC TO YOUR WEBSITE-

Traffic brought from organic searches and even PPC are either familiar with your brand or are looking for keywords you already rank for

Social media marketing gives you the power to add another method of gaining traction and visitors to your site.

It is a great way of getting people who aren’t already loyal to you, interested in your brand.

Every post you make has the potential of bringing in more people to your website and increasing your brand’s following/ awareness.

I have even started this myself, where I send my social media followers through to my website where I speak in more detail about being an indie game developer and the game I’m working on.

This way I can familiarise them with my brand, build authority and get them to join my community discord server.

This is a great way to bring people in for certain products and services without having to compete with huge and established websites. This is also a great method of bringing in a younger demographic.

An older person may search something up through Google. However, a millennial may just search it up on whatever social media they are on, it’s just a lot more convenient for them. Which should make this an even bigger priority for you.

3. PROMOTE YOUR CONTENT

You’ve released a new product or offer a new service. Where do you advertise that?

Your website, or maybe even outside your physical store. Both viable and worthwhile options, but what’s the point of putting out a something new to existing customers.

There is not a total chance they’ll buy it and you are limiting yourself to such a small number of people when your product has so much more potential.

Just think about it, having the chance to reach millions of new people. It is a modern equivalent to running an advert on TV or putting up billboards.

However, there are many reasons why they are more effective including:

• Social media is more personal and has a higher chance of conversion.
• It actually gets recommended to people that the social media platform thinks will be interested in your content.
• It is also permanently up. (Unless you delete it)
• Has a larger potential audience of people who will see it, since there are millions on social media.
• Easier for people to impulse buy and search for the product since there will probably be a link on your posts or bio.
• You can get instant feedback from customers and then personally speak to them and sell to them directly on social media.
• Lastly, it’s a LOT CHEAPER. Using social media is free. You can pay extra for promotions, however, they are a lot cheaper than other mediums.

4. SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING CAN BE USED FOR LINK BUILDING

Social media marketing doesn’t only reach customers. It reaches everyone in your sector too.

Including competitors, reviewers, and journalists. Why is this helpful?

Well, if these people see your content and services on social media, they are likely to mention you.

If you are in the business of SEO like us, other websites will use your articles and link to them in theirs.

You could be a restaurant or clothing store and if a reviewer or a journalist saw you online it could make them interested in your brand and they could review your products.

In addition to the link building aspect, this could also help you increase your business relations with other brands or influencers in your sector, who have seen your posts and support your brand’s message or endorse your product’s or service’s quality.

5. GAIN MARKETPLACE INSIGHTS USING SOCIAL LISTENING

Customers are putting out their thoughts and conversations online, this information is invaluable to any business. You can monitor everything on social media:

You can see what people say when they mention your brand’s name, your customer’s hobbies and interests, the demographic who like your products, what they are saying about your competitors and even find out what they want from your product or their motivations behind why they require from your product.

The list goes on but at the end of the day, it is just common sense. Who better to ask about your customer’s needs than your customers.

On top of this making your brand feel more personable and making the customer feel more important, this also helps with improving your services and increasing the number of people who you can market it to.

This information is something you would never get from comments on your website or from coworkers. This is like a giant focus group, but these people aren’t being put on the spot. They are able to articulate and collect their thoughts and deliver them unfiltered.

6. BETTER CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

Your customers are using social media why aren’t you?

One thing that social media marketing can do is to make a brand a lot more personable and human.

As a consumer, it’s nice knowing that your comments and thoughts are being heard and taken into consideration. It is especially nice when you get sent an actual response.

Personally, I think its one of the best ways to grow a business. Since instead of it being some company trying to take all of your money.

Instead, it actually feels like you’re buying something off someone you know and like. It makes it a very similar feeling to shopping at a local store where you can speak to and know the owners.

 

Keeping customers happy has never been easier.

Social media means you’re only a tweet away and makes your customers feel valued and heard due to how fast responses are. (Twitter is great for customer service)

People love supporting people and brands they like. That’s part of the way celebrities make money and where Youtubers make most of their money.

Their merchandise is very basic and usually only has a word or a picture.

But the thing that you need to keep in mind is that the customer is still satisfied with the product because they want to support something they like, and social media is the key to that because it is so easy to communicate and network using it.

7. A/B TESTING TO GET THE BIGGEST RESULTS — ANALYTICS

If you run a website or a business, you’ll understand how important analytics truly are. Being able to see how you are performing in real time.

There are specific analytics tools on social media websites like Youtube or Facebook, which give so much useful information.

You can see what your demographic is, and can modify your content to fit them.

An amazing method you can use is A/B Testing. You can plan what sort of content you are going to post, and modify it slightly every time

Track these results and you can find out how important each change is, you can check impressions, interactions and even conversions.

Identify who it is that loves your content and who is most likely to buy something from you.

With this information you can create a campaign for different social media by finding a good combination between getting the most impressions, increasing your followers and generating the most revenue. There are already many people doing this successfully.

One example I would recommend looking at is Foundr’s Instagram account. Nathan Chan has made Foundr into a multi-million dollar company by building himself up on Instagram.

8. HELPING YOUR BRAND GO VIRAL

Social media marketing gives you the potential to reach millions of more people than you could ever imagine. If hashtags are used, shares direct people back to the company, and it gives a huge ROI if done properly.

But the issue is how do you do that? You can’t just make a video or a post that is destined to go viral, even if you are using analytics and a strategy. After you post it, the internet takes the wheel

When you actually look at viral ads you may notice that most of them are actually quite normal.

They may be well-designed or have a great message but they aren’t anything out of the ordinary. You may put it down to the fact that the companies already have a large following.

The secret is not to create something to go viral.

Work to create a great piece of content that people will enjoy, and be consistent. Don’t expect to gain huge traction from a single video when you have no following. These big companies you see today also started from nothing but are dominant now due to how constant their efforts are.

Here’s an example of someone who wasn’t some big corporation who people never give enough credit to. The viral sensation Big Shaq is someone who went viral after he recorded a freestyle rap on a show called Fire In The Booth.

This became extremely popular on the internet. Some people found it funny, others made memes of it and some even enjoyed listening to it.

After watching his video you may think, wow this wasn’t even that great. However, if you actually look into his history, Big Shaq is actually a persona played by the comedian Michael Dapaah, who has actually been creating quality comedic sketches for years.

I will reiterate this point because I think it is extremely vital to. The key is to create high-quality content and be consistent!

9. INCREASED BRAND AUTHORITY

You interacting with your customers makes them feel valued and increases their loyalty. When people want to talk about a product or a service they received they go on social media. Others in their circle will now want to follow you and see what you could provide them.

If you are inactive or not present that is a huge loss. But if you are actively posting things and replying to people it makes you more credible and on that persons mind more often.

Customers that are happy with your services are keen to post it online and brag about their experiences.

There is nothing that gives more credibility than a satisfied customers testimonial. Not to mention being able to interact with major influencers who can give you a huge boost.

10. COST-EFFECTIVE — LOSSES ARE CLOSE TO ZERO

So if you aren’t totally convinced at this point, here’s a point that will change your mind. Social media marketing is free!

Unless you want to pay for extra promotion (which is also quite cheap and effective compared to alternatives). In the last point, I mentioned that nothing is better than customer testimonials. Well, if you get enough of those you have essentially got a group of people to pay for your product and advertise it for free!

A large number of marketers only spend up to 6 hours a week on social media posts too. It is quick and cheap.

Due to this, there are relatively no losses. You don’t spend much time on it and you don’t waste much money on it, so anything you get from that side is immediately a win.

If you enjoyed this blog post please share it online and with others who could learn from it. If I have missed any benefits or you have other thoughts of social media marketing suggest it in the comments, I would love to have a discussion about it.