Admit it; you probably have opened a social media app just to avoid making eye contact with someone, let alone talking to them. Although we may not be able to share our favourite performances live at a concert or post a picture of that delicious burger before it devours in your mouth in a matter of seconds, we are more active on social media now as there has been an increase in usage by over sixty-one percent according to Pew Research.

So if your business isn’t on social, we’re expecting a good excuse as to why.

Here are 5 reasons why you need to market your business on social media.

1. It’s Cost Effective!

The first thing businesses would want to consider is how much a marketing strategy would cost them, and compared to other options, social media is one of the cheapest to pursue. There are no registration fees to sign up your business on any of the major social media platforms, and if you did want to spend more money on paid advertising, it won’t cost you an arm and a leg like traditional marketing does.

You need to post often (especially now), and if you can’t? It’s simple. Hire us to do it. We know that now more than ever, social media (if done properly) will be one of your biggest streams of revenue.

2. Increases Traffic

A strong social media presence means that you will reach more people online. When you reach more people online, you increase your chances of creating interest in your brand. The more people that are interested in your brand, the more people buy. The more people that buy, the more money your business makes. The more money your business makes, the more referrals you get, and the bigger your business gets.

Pretty simple, isn’t it?

The Cincinnati Zoo is a great example since they are a business that is highly dependent on visitors buying tickets to be physically present; they instead used this opportunity to become much more creative and effective. They produced “Home Safari Facebook Live,” an interactive educational experience for kids worldwide as they get to experience the safari right from their homes, as kids were able to complete assignments and ask questions. This resulted in reaching more people than imagined while increasing their brand recognition.

3. Always Adapting And Innovating

The amazing thing about social media is that it continues to provide new updates to deliver a better user experience that benefits both users and businesses. Facebook live was only launched a few years ago, yet it was utilized by a local zoo to connect with people around the globe. There are so many different social media platforms that have specialized in specific areas that businesses have been benefiting from, especially since we are in the era of social media marketing. Whether it is Twitter’s geo-targeting or Facebook’s interactive messenger, there are tools that can be used to a business’ benefit and to please the customer.

One social media platform that stepped up to support small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic was Instagram as they started to implement a new “support small business” sticker that users and businesses can easily share to their stories. It was a great move by Instagram as many small businesses started to incorporate it, and loyal customers were more than happy to help support them by sharing and helping generate awareness and leads for potential customers.

4. Easy To Use And Engage

If you were Batman, social media would be your Robin. It’s a HUGE asset to helping you be more connected with customers, and as you know, strong relationships equal strong retention. There has been a rapid growth in social media users, especially since there are more than 3.8 billion active users.

It’s way easier and convenient for someone to tweet a complaint or send a direct message for a product inquiry rather than sending an email or visiting in-person. It’s also easier for the business to use social media rather than providing an out-dated press release or creating a TV spot. Therefore, businesses need to implement social media to their marketing and communication strategy to build an online community to ensure they can be responsive in a timely manner. It’s critical that you are doing what you can to provide a positive experience since it has been reported that seventy-one percent of consumers who’ve had a positive experience with a brand are more likely to recommend it to friends and family, which means, you guessed it, free marketing for you!

5. Know Everything Behind-The-Scenes

To really build a community and a loyal following, you need to learn more about your followers and your target market. The beauty of a business using social media is that they can learn more about their intended customers than they could have ever done before. The added benefit is that most social media platforms have an internal analytics feature that is made for business accounts for the exceptional price of free.  Pictured below is one of the most popular free built-in analytics for Instagram Insights.

If you’re not posting frequently or creating the engaging content needed to spark conversations and emotions to better understand your customers, you can look at other websites that provide you with more detailed analytics.

Nonetheless, the data you get from social media can be used to make the necessary improvements to your business. You can introduce new products/services or content that your customers would appreciate, which will help you gain the upper hand against your competitors.

When it comes to gaining the proper exposure WITHOUT PAID ADS on social media, it’s much like baking a cake, there’s a specific recipe, and if you don’t follow that recipe, you’ll get, well, not a cake.

We know you’re busy and don’t have the time to do all this yourself, so give us a call! We’ll have a brief chat, assess your current social presence, and map out a detailed plan on how we will take it to the next level. We look forward to chatting!

(437) 317-4451 | info@yourlistingexpert.com | yourlistingexpert.com

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Citations

https://www.facebook.com/business/news/how-businesses-are-using-social-media-during-coronavirus

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanholmes/2020/04/24/is-covid-19-social-medias-levelling-up-moment/#502baf546c60

https://business.instagram.com/blog/supporting-small-businesses-on-instagram

https://later.com/blog/instagram-analytics/

https://www.oberlo.com/blog/social-media-marketing-statistics

https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/fact-sheet/social-media/