Sure, posting and connecting to your customers via social media is ideal for attracting your audience. You may be doing everything in your power to create a successful social media marketing campaign including using blog writers for hire. However, are your efforts paying off? If you are in the dark on this, it’s time for a social media profile audit.
Social Media Strategy
Without a clear-cut set of goals for what you want to accomplish with social media, you have no basis for evaluation. Write out a social media strategy that includes:
- How many places you are working with social media, ie. Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn
- How much time you spend on these pages
- What you are promoting on social media
- What your current fan and followership is and where you want it to be in six months
- Who your target audience is and how you are attracting/repelling them
Once you have answered these questions, you can focus on a strategy for moving forward. First off, consider which pages you have in operation that you do not use on a regular basis. Cut your losses on pages that are stagnant rather than allowing customers to connect to an out-of-date, dead page.
Bull’s Eye on Your Audience
In terms of audience, these are your customers, present and future. If you determine that you are not connecting to your targeted audience, your social media marketing scheme is dead in the water. In finding ways to connect with your demographic, keep it focused on social media.
- Do you want to have a younger, hipper crowd? Look for where they are congregating, such as Instagram, and set up a contest there.
- Are you targeting a more mature, male-based audience? One tip is to post videos that are targeted toward this population, e.g. car racing or fishing videos, which will most likely be shared among other males in their group.
A final note on your audience is social engagement. Keep your audience engaged by replying to their comments. Don’t leave your customers hanging when they have questions, comments or concerns.
Time Management
One major concern of marketers who use social media is that this form of social engagement can become a time-suck. While keeping track of your time spent on daily social media activities is ideal for future analysis, there are ways to maximize your efforts immediately. Consider using programs and apps that streamline the process, such as SavePublishing and Buffer. Also, instead of posting on multiple sites, get into the hashtag habit. By adding a hashtag to all of your posts on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest, you can post to multiple pages with a single click.
A final thing to consider is your online reputation. So many customers are now dependent on social media for connecting with businesses and it may be the only time you get to meet “face-to-face” with your clients. Keep your posts focused and avoid commenting on anything that is not related to your business.
Miranda B is a freelance writer available on WriterAccess, a marketplace where clients and expert writers connect for assignments.
