If you are new to social media, or trying to convince your boss to start using it as a marking tool – sometimes, you just need a quick answer. Here are some important answers for your best social media questions.
1. How do you measure the return on investment (ROI)?
Let’s start with the toughest one first - If you are trying to pitch a new marketing concept to your boss, odds are their first question will be, “What’s my return on investment?”
You can easily find concrete evidence and metrics that show the direct traffic, leads, and conversions that come from social media channels. In fact, Facebook even offers a Conversion Measurement tool to accurately measure ROI for that channel. Other platform, such as LinkedIn and Twitter have their own analytics to help prove their solid ROI.
2. Do you really need a Google+ Account?
Absolutely - After a slow start, Google+ has reportedly grown to over 300 million active-users, surpassing Twitter’s 270 million users. With some unique sharing options and friendly interface, it has become a tool that content marketers can no longer ignore.
Sure, many of us didn’t take Google+ seriously enough since it launched. But early adopters have seen a remarkable results in engagement and leads. While the social media platform may not have the number of users that Facebook has, companies across all industries are beginning to understand the benefits of promoting their content through Google+.
3. Can Social Media save you money?
Actually, yes – Think of it this way: with traditional advertising, you are spending money for targeted placement, hoping that the right pair of eyes catch your brand and start moving down the buyer-funnel. Social media has created the opportunity to advertise your brand, market your product, and engage directly with an audience unlike anything before. Social media channels give brands a chance to reach a mind-melting amount of people, and pressing the “share” button is always free.
As another example, social media is a great way to cut costs on customer service. Brands can now chat with customers directly, and use analytics to see how they’re responding to content or products. Instead of spending money toward on-call customer service representatives, or endless test markets for new products, social can erase those costs by simply creating a venue for these insights.
4. Which social media platforms should my business have a presence on?
This answer depends on where your targeted audience spends most of their time. Even though Facebook and Twitter are arguably the most popular of the social networks, diversification is a huge trend in this modern marketing landscape. Depending on the audience you're targeting, being active on a single network is simply not enough. According to The Content Marketing Institute, the most successful B2B marketers are active on an average of 7 networks.
A majority of followers might be coming from your Twitter account, but that doesn’t mean that heavy influencers or clients are utilizing the LinkedIn or Google+ space – it’s crucial to establish your brand on each channel to build an authoritative stance within the industry.
5. Is YouTube important for my brand?
Although you might not have the same engagement or number of followers with a YouTube channel, it’s still an important tool for companies looking to build on their content marketing efforts. YouTube brings in over 1 billion unique monthly visitors – that’s a lot of traffic. 100 million Internet users watch online video each day –90% of online shoppers say they find video helpful in making shopping and buying decisions, while 75% of executives told Forbes that they watch work-related videos at least once a week.
Regardless of your industry - if you have a website and a camera - start producing video content. Aside from the vast amount of people you can reach with video, you can more effectively work to build relationships and trust with these new found viewers. Video allows you to be more personable, more relatable, and memorable. They can be funny, exciting, and informative all at the same time – making them sharable and engaging.
6. What are some of the best practices on Twitter?
#hashtags - By now everybody should be familiar with, or use #hashtags. Twitter hashtags will help you find posts or organize your own that use the same #hashtag. When it comes to improving search rankings and generating buzz around your content, these tags are extremely valuable.Consistently using them will mean more people see your tweets. With every favorited tweet, or retweet, your content is shared through an even bigger audience.
Twitter is also a great opportunity to directly connect with your audience in real-time. Twitter’s active users are constantly looking for feedback and answers to their questions – it’s your job as a brand to provide a solution to their issues, or responses to their comments.
7. Do I need a Facebook business page?
Again, this will depend on your established target audience, but I find it harder to find companies that shouldn’t have one vs. companies that should. At this point, most brands have an audience that utilizes Facebook one way or another. By creating a Facebook business page, brands provide an authoritative arena for followers to interact, ask questions, or engage with posted content.
8. How much time should social media marketing take each week?
With all these conversations happening in real-time and the constant promotion through social media, it’s easy to understand how marketing through social media can take up some time. Social media should not be looked at as an hourly project – sure, for those overly organized workers out there, it might be best to set some time aside for social media to stay on track. But it should also be looked at as an ongoing change to the way you interact with your customers.
Marketing with social media should take on a “help first, sell second” philosophy without a stop button. With the time you spend interacting with followers on social media, you are directly impacting your authority within the industry – trust with your customers – and leads, conversions or sales for your business.
9. What is the biggest mistake brands make with social media marketing mistakes business make?
Inconsistency – This can mean a few things: Some brands inconsistently post content on social media, and never really engage with their audience. This gives off a robotic, impersonal feel for brands that are actually trying to connect with a larger audience.
Another way brands are inconsistent is the type of content they are delivering to their followers. If a brand is sharing content through their branded Facebook page, it needs to be relevant and useful for people related to that industry or interest. In order for social media to be effective, you must consistently publish quality content (whether from you or someone else) to provide value to followers. With this value, comes customer loyalty, and an authoritative voice within your industry.
10. How can I find marketing success with social media?
Publish High-Quality Content and Promote it - From a content marketing perspective, this is Rule #1 – “Content is king”, right? Publishing great content is the first step toward social media success. Generate some great content ideas and start creating articles, videos, free guides, resource pages, etc. Promote it through various social media channels that relate to the audience you are trying to reach.
Remember, that great content won’t get very far if you don’t make it easy to share. Allowing people to easily share your content on the various social networks connects your brand to the broadest audience possible; boosting search and social traffic, leads, and potentially, overall sales. Be sure to add social-sharing buttons at the bottom of each content piece you create.
Social media has been a proven marketing tool for years now, if your brand has not worked to build a presence through the various available channels – you are behind the game. Not only can social media help gather a larger following and boost traffic, it can directly influences leads and conversion rates for companies in any industry.
Brad Kuenn is a Content Writer, Editor and Strategist living in Nashville, Tennessee, and he provides research, content topics, writing, editing, and content development expertise to clients. He has a passion for writing as well as art, which shines through in his work. His creativity and attention to detail makes him a valuable asset for a wide range of clients. During his time off he enjoys spending time with his wife, family, and his two dogs Brutus and Kane.
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