We know we should be out there, posting away, reaching our target audience, and marketing our businesses via the various social media platforms. But, it’s a doggy dog world, and we are always nervous of what we put online.

Will my content speak to the essence of my brand?

What if the world thinks I sound ridiculous?

Will the effort reap the rewards?

All valid questions.

And, like with most things in life, you need to take the plunge. However, like with most things in life, taking the plunge shouldn’t be done by the seat of your pants.

Some planning and strategy is needed. Aaah, yes, that word … STRATEGY! All goals generally had a good plan set out before the leap was taken. It is not to say that you may not reach your goal without a plan, but it will more than likely take much longer, and with a greater amount of effort.

So, what can you do?

Our 5 Awesome Tips to Social Media for your Business

1. Understand your product – Understand your audience

Before you even start deciding what to post and which platforms to use, know what you are marketing and who to.

This should form part of your Business Plan, where you would have thought about what your USP is and your Target Audience. If you haven’t done this, now would be a good time to. Nowadays, you can download many templates for business plans, or you can sign up with a Business Broker, who will guide you. It’s scary this business thing!

From this you will know just what you are selling. Your products and services will lead you to who your target audience is. And, by knowing this, you will need to speak to them in a way that will appeal to them.

E.g.

Product= Low Fat Milk Shakes

Audience = Dairy-tolerant users, kids, healthy-living individuals, dieters, fitness people, etc.

Keeping your brand in mind too, you need to ensure your words speak to your brand, and speak to your audience.

2. Plan Plan Plan

You need a plan. You need a schedule of what you will be posting.

Break your business down into what you offer, and this is not only your products and services. It’s your knowledge base, the advice you can give, and the tips you can offer. You want to be the go-to guy (or gal) in your particular field.

Further, you can promote your brand. You want your audience to recognise your brand, so ensure your logo appears always, and your words are synonymous with your look and feel.

3. Consistency

This is very important. If you decide to use social media to market your business, then you need to keep at it. Positive results will not happen overnight. The stats show that you need to be consistently posting for at least 6 months before you will see a difference.

Remember, as well, that there are millions of users, and not everyone will see your posts.  Reposting, posting often, and sharing, will increase the chances of your posts reaching more people.

4. Decide which social media platforms works for your business

There are many, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, just to mention a few. But, not all of these will suit your brand and your product offering.  The only way you will know which will work is to give each a try for a while.

There will be obvious platforms that you know just won’t work, but if you are not sure, sign up to all, and give them all a good go.

Most times, it ends up that you will choose 3-4 platforms. And, often that works best, enabling you to focus better on targeting the right audience.

5. Content is King

No matter your offering, your content needs to follow a few guidelines:

• Different content for different platforms – don’t get stuck in the rut of posting exactly the same content for each platform. Here is a really cool infographic that explains that point in a nutshell
• Audience driven content – again, know your audience! You cannot be using cool, teen lingo, if your audience is aged 30 to 60. Know what words you should be using, and how you should be structuring your sentences
• Repeat, but don’t be overkill – repeating topics and various mediums of content is fine, but beware of repeating too often. Spread it out. Keeping a content calendar is paramount for this to work
• Research – read often, subscribe to newsletters, listen out for ideas –these are great ways to keep ahead of the pack, and become the go-to person in your industry. Don’t ever put something out there of which you are not 100% sure of

Shew! That was serious info-overload!

All the more reason to employ the services of a Content Manager …