A strong presence on social media increases brand awareness for your business because you get to reach a large customer base within a short period of time. This can be done through creating extremely innovative content for your social media networks.
Constructing effective and engaging posts that will instantly connect your brand to your audience is the key to a powerful social presence.
With that in mind, here are five ways to refine your brand’s presence on social media:
1. Choose the right social media platforms
There are a variety of social media platforms available to brands but they don’t cater to all businesses. It is important to know how each platform functions in different industries because the users are diverse — not every platform will have
your target audience.
Check out the most popular platforms according to the Social Media Marketing Poll 2019:
Facebook
This is the most popular social media network in the world,
with more than three billion users. This platform is perfect for a brand that wants to boost leads and build relationships with consumers. This is because it gives an opportunity for brands to offer the best customer service experience.
It does this by alerting your brand to questions that need answering, as users can just @mention your brand when they have a query. This will send your brand a notification, letting you know that there is a post that requires your attention.
Twitter
This platform gives a steady stream of information; you can find trending topics, news and hashtags that might help you with search engine optimisation. This is a platform that is well suited for public interaction because it allows direct two-way communication among its users, which can give your brand an opportunity to be on top of things in terms of customer service.
Instagram
This platform is more about visual engagement and is great for building brand awareness. The type of content that generally reigns on this particular platform includes images, short videos, reels and Stories, which are temporary videos that are uploaded by the account holder.
Additionally, having more likes and comments increases visibility through the creation of high-quality photos or videos and partnering with other brands.
Linkedin
This platform connects your brand to your audience on a professional level. It is a business networking platform that can help you refine your brand reputation through consistent branding across the network.
You can also achieve this by organising rich content that shows thought leadership expertise. Some examples of this include:
- quote images from members within your corporate team
- statistics and facts about the industry that you work in, and
- text-based posts that give meaningful insights about your profession and the work that you do.
2. Use the SMART technique
This is a method of goal setting that you can use to set your marketing objectives in a way that is specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and timely.
For example, if you want to increase brand awareness, your goal could be to grow your Instagram followers by 10% within two months. The SMART tactic for this would be:
Specific – Identify what you want to accomplish. In this case, it would be growing your audience by 10% within the time period of two months.
Measurable – Determine the number of followers you’d like to have after your goal has been accomplished. Ensure that it equates to 10%.
Achievable – Think about how you’re going to achieve this goal. For example, you could increase your following by creating and posting visual content because it is simply more engaging.
Relevant – Look at the relevance of your goal in terms of your brand's success. Because you are trying to gain followers on a visual platform such as Instagram, you would need to post high-quality photos and videos frequently to drive traffic.
Timely – In order to reach your goal, you need to commit to a time frame. In this instance, it would be reaching your goal within a two-month period.
3. Seek relationships with your followers
If your goal is to build relationships with potential customers, it is
not enough to just post your content and walk off. Having followers who regularly engage with your brand is undeniably more valuable than followers who don’t. You can engage with your audience by:
- Starting and participating in conversations: For example, you can craft engaging content that is related to your industry to encourage discussions.
- Commenting on posts with @mentions and sharing picture credits: For example, you can be personal with your consumers by directly mentioning their names when responding to them. It is important to keep in mind that when consumers receive personalised responses from a brand, they are more likely to share it with their own audiences.
- Sharing relevant information on a regular basis: You can do this by posting relevant news or sharing interesting infographics to keep your audience informed and gripped.
- Addressing complaints when they are raised: It’s important to do this because it helps your brand to recognise areas that need improvement and to build customer loyalty.
4. Use visuals
Visual content includes images, charts, infographics and videos. This is a vital element for your marketing success as it captures attention, increases engagement and, as an added bonus, it is aesthetically pleasing.
With that in mind, always remember that your post caption is
also important when combined with visuals, as it sparks further interest from audiences.
Visuals dominate on social media platforms with some of them even going viral. They can also be posted on these networks and can include team photos, event videos, educational infographics or live videos. This is a great social marketing trend for your business as it will increase awareness and give your brand a stronger identity.
5. Humanise your content
Consumers prefer content that is more ‘human’ because they can relate, trust and remember the brand.
One of the ways in which you can get in touch with the ‘human’ side of your brand is to occasionally show the faces behind the scenes. This can be done by posting photos or videos of your team in the office, or by showing off their unique personalities through team building activities and games.
You can also get more engagement by commenting on your audiences’ posts. For example, you can reply with meaningful and relevant information or ask questions. Because you are responding individually to these posts, it shows that you are willing to take the time to interact with your audience on a personal level over and above a professional one. Thus, showing that you are ‘human’.
Finally, it’s important to continuously share valuable advice and information, as it gives your audience a reason to keep checking your social media page. This also showcases your brand’s thought leadership expertise.
A social media presence is indisputably valuable for modern businesses. With this in mind, how else do you think brands can improve on their social media presence? Let us know in the comments section below.
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Want to learn more about how to humanise your brand on social media? Check out our Infographic: Being human on social media is not overrated.
*Image courtesy of Pixabay