Social media is used by everyone to reach people that otherwise may not know about you. It gives you a chance to interact with your customers in a unique way that through normal means would not necessarily be possible.
Vary Your Posts
Having posts that tell your followers about your products and offers are of course essential to all business social media pages. However if you are constantly trying to sell something people will start to leave you. Have a bit of variety in your posts, tell a joke, start a discussion, ask a question or perhaps start a competition.
Know Your Audience
It’s worth knowing who your target audiences are, from an ideal age range and gender to where they live. Making sure you are targeting the right people for your company and page to bring in the followers and hopefully the sales. Finally remember that pretty much everyone is on a social network of some sort these days but also that not everyone is going to be interested in your business.
Think Ahead
Keep in mind that not everything is going to go your way. People can and in some cases will search for you on the different social networks and post complaints. Being able to show other users that you are willing and capable of dealing with problems will work in your favour. Decide whether you want to have a standard response (such as ‘we will pass on your details to customer services, who will get in touch asap’) or something more tailored to the actual complaint. It is also worth noting that removing complaints from view is not necessarily a good idea, and could just upset people more than they already are.
Also be careful what you say in your posts, as a certain company found out recently on Facebook, saying the wrong thing in a post can upset and alienate a lot of people. And this can be made worse if your official response is not well thought out and up to scratch.
Some days you will have trouble coming up with new and interesting posts, so it may be worth planning posts a few days ahead, or just making notes when you have idea so that they can be used in the future.
If you post it they will come….eventually
As with most things it takes time to progress in social media. People are not going to come flooding onto your new social media page. It takes time to entice people, but patience will pay off if your content is up to the task. Also remember once you have a good sized following that not every follower equals a sale.
Be Social
It’s all well and good posting every day, whether it is a piece of marketing about a new product or just something witty. But your customers like to know that there is a human being behind it all, someone who can easily talk to and discuss different topics. Make your social media page(s) fun and interesting for your followers so that they will keep coming back. Start discussions about one of your products or a related topic and encourage your followers to join in. Social media is a great way to get suggestions and ideas from your customers since you are able to pretty much instantly comment on it and allow the idea to grow. Asking your customers for their opinion on your products, or even possible future products, is a great way to increase customer loyalty and make them feel part of the team.
Direct People To Your Social Media Pages
Don’t forget that while you are posting, tweeting etc there are others in your company doing other forms of marketing that you can work in conjunction with. If your company sends out brochures or emails you can prompt people to join you on Facebook or Twitter or any other social network along with a link. Any boxed products that are sent out can also potentially have your social media links printed on them or in the form of a QR code.
Summary
Producing quality content for social media is relatively easy, it can just take a while to build up a decent following. However if you prepare yourself and stick with it through the bad times, because they will happen, you will come out the other end with a loyal fan base.
