Human beings need connection.
Maybe this urge for connection is what drives social media addiction in modern society. Social media is used by 4.70 billion people worldwide, who log onto their preferred platforms for 2.5 hours every day on average.
Social media was initially used as a communication tool. You could update your family on life events, stay in touch or reconnect with old friends, make new ones, or even join online communities.
As social media became more widespread, its purpose began to alter. Brands began to take notice of social media and its potential to revolutionise the marketing mix.
It’s not simple to advertise on social media. To successfully connect with a target audience through strategy and creativity, a marketer needs to be highly skilled. Furthermore, it involves more than just updating social media accounts, making memes, and answering comments.
What Is Social Media Marketing?
The process of using social media to reach and interact with your audience, establish your brand, and drive income is known as social media marketing. To thrive in social media marketing, brands must generate real content that is targeted to their audience’s needs and interests, analyse engagement rates through analytics, and use this data to continuously improve.
In its early stages, brands used social media marketing to direct viewers to a company’s website with the intention of making a sale. Today, however, social media profiles are viewed as an extension of a company’s website; in order to enhance the likelihood of user involvement and satisfy social media algorithms, content should be created for and published directly to a social media platform.
On social media, branded content can take one of two forms:
1. Organic Content
To get the most out of organic content, brands should use the free tools and resources available on their preferred platforms to create a brand profile page with a profile picture, cover image, description, business hours, and links to your website, among other things; company updates in the form of text, photos, videos, or gifs; a branded group or community page, live-video content; and more.
The reach of organic content is determined by social media algorithms, which prioritise posts in users’ feeds depending on relevance and time of publication. Algorithms determine how likely a user is to see your content; interests, previous interactions with your brand, and hashtags used all play a role in what organic content appears in a person’s feed.
So, for example, if someone engages with an Instagram post about baking, that user is likely to be offered more baking-related posts in the future because the algorithm assumes this person is interested in baking.
2. Paid Content
Paid social media can supplement your organic content or drive leads for your business through down-the-funnel advertising efforts. Many social media marketers have felt the impact of algorithms on their reach; despite having tens of thousands of followers, organic posting can frequently appear to fall short of expectations. Paid social advertising, often known as ‘sponsored’ content on a user’s feed, can help you expand your reach and offer your content to a larger audience.
You will have greater control over who sees your content because social networks will allow you to target specific audiences based on demographics, location, interests, and other factors.
Brands that excel in social media marketing use a strategy that combines both free and sponsored content, making sure to conduct research, plan ahead, and optimise each step along the way.
8 Benefits of Social Media Marketing
Social media advertising has a number of benefits. If social media advertising isn’t currently a part of your overall marketing plan, you may be missing the chance to reach more customers, increase conversions, and develop higher levels of customer satisfaction.
Here’s a list of the top 8 benefits of social media marketing:
1. Improve Brand Awareness
People don’t just interact with companies they are familiar with and have previously used for services or products. In fact, 83% of the consumers polled said they regularly find new products and services. More people will become aware of your brand as you invest more time and energy into your social media strategy. That’s exactly what we seek.
The internet can be dangerous, and the booming e-commerce industry has turned it into a haven for scammers, hackers, and other cybercriminals. These crimes fall into three primary categories: monetary fraud, identity theft, and buying scams.
As customers gain confidence in dealing with online risks to their privacy and security, they look for signs of trustworthiness before engaging in transactions with a new or previously unknown business.
You can make your social media presence more credible by doing the following:
- Making sure that all branding features, such as @ handles, logos, colours, branded hashtags, photos, and so on, are present and consistent with your main website.
- Ensure to include a secure link to your website and any relevant social media networks in your profiles.
- Always respond to both positive and negative consumer comments and criticism.
- Maintain consistency with graphic components such as image filters, fonts for text in media content, colours, and so on.
- Maintain a consistent and clear brand voice across all social media channels.
2. Increase Brand Loyalty
Customers will begin to value you and your brand as you establish your brand and cultivate relationships with them. 76% of consumers say they would prefer buying from a brand with which they have a personal connection than from the competition. Developing long-term relationships with customers is a vital aspect of maintaining a loyal client base.
3. Increase Credibility
Consumers are more likely to regard you as a reputable source if you generate and post more content throughout your social media channels. A strong content strategy is also important for your brand’s trustworthiness. Consumers will be lured to your brand for more information about a related issue if you share your material on social media frequently.
Interacting with consumers on a regular basis shows that your company values customer happiness and is willing to answer any questions they may have. Customers who are pleased with a product or service are eager to spread the word, and they frequently use social media to do it. Customers who mention your business on social media will promote your business and show your value and brand authority to new visitors.
4. Learn More About Your Customers
It’s critical to understand your target audience’s interests and behaviours.
Social media provides you with a wealth of information about your clients, which you can utilise to improve your marketing strategies. Building ties with your customers allows you to better understand them. Furthermore, social media networks provide metrics about your clients’ ages, cities, which of your content they engage with the most and other related information.
5. Learn More About Your Competitors
Maintaining a competitive advantage is a major reason why customers are drawn to your company in the first place. To effectively preserve that edge, you must first understand who your competitors are and what they are doing. You should also pay attention to what customers are saying about your competitors. Is there a problem with their products or services? Is there something they’re doing that you’re not that benefits them?
Understanding your competition and improving your marketing efforts will benefit from having this information.
6. Create Immediate Exposure for Your Brand
You can gain quick visibility for your business by advertising on social media. When you post organically, you rely entirely on your followers to interact with your content. Most of the time, you just hope that your followers will share your content with their friends and relatives.
Paid advertising, on the other hand, allows you to expose your content to thousands of consumers who are relevant to your brand, even if they have never heard of you.
7. Increase Website Traffic
As previously said, social media can direct customers to your website.
Sharing new content or blog posts on your social media accounts is an excellent strategy to increase traffic. According to SEMrush, the number of direct website visitors is a key ranking indicator. As a result, the more high-quality visitors you have to your website, the better. Make sure to include links to your website in all of your posts and on all of your social media pages.
8. Higher Conversion Rates
Increased visibility means more conversion opportunities for your company. Every blog post, photograph, or video has the potential to drive traffic to your company’s website.
When brands connect on social media by sharing content, commenting, and publishing status updates, they personify their brand. Over 51% of marketers indicated that spending time establishing relationships with customers resulted in increased sales. The stronger the impression you make on a visitor, the more likely they are to remember your company when they need your product or service. According to studies, social media has a 100% higher lead-to-close rate than outbound marketing.
Get Started Today!
Social media marketing is a powerful tool with numerous benefits for your business; it is a continuous activity that must be incorporated into your overall marketing plan and weekly routine. As a constantly evolving practice, you must always aim to be creative and on-trend, and ultimately, show your audience what a great brand you are.
Social media advertising is a user-friendly, cost-effective, and customisable way to promote your products and services to millions of people all at once. This is why it is critical to invest time in understanding how social media advertising platforms can target your business’s ideal audience, before settling on which platforms to use.
Book your discovery session to see how Crunchy Digital can revolutionise your digital marketing and increase your sales and marketing performance. If you have any questions, feel free to contact us at www.crunchydigital.com.au; we’re excited to hear from you!
