Social Media is a staple in many of our personal and professional lives. If you’re a small business that’s not already using social media then you’re missing out. Social media can be a source of huge traffic, as well as does wonders for your online presence and brand awareness. Even a few hours per week put into social media can do wonders in these areas for your business.
In this article we’ll look at 6 tips for getting started on social media as a small business. There’s certainly a lot more to it (and we’ll be putting out articles that go more in depth), but hopefully this gives a nice primer on where to start.
Target Relevant Social Networks
The first step is to figure out which social media networks you want to target. While having a presence on all channels is a good goal, getting there takes a lot of work. Generating engaging content for a wide variety of social platforms takes a lot of work, and it’s usually best to start with 2-3 key ones.
This decision should be informed by your target market. Each platform is going to have slightly different demographics, so you should look to go where your customers already are.
Here’s a decent look at social media demographics from last year. You can use this to help inform your decision.
You should also check out the platforms and search your niche. See how different types of content perform, and use that to gauge interest in your topic. This is also a great way to start generating content ideas.
Start With a Plan
As with all things, failing to plan is planning to fail. You should go into your social media marketing with a plan of attack; doing so now is going to save you a lot of time later.
There are many ways to create social media plan, but I think there are a few key questions you should always be answering
- Who are my target audience
- What are my competitors doing on social media
- What types of content do I want to post
- How often should I post
These are 4 key questions you need to be able to answer before creating a social media plan, although there’s certainly a lot more. Let’s briefly take a look at what goes into each one.
Who are My Target Audience
A key part of any marketing plan is you need to know who you’re marketing to. This will inform your social media platforms as well as the content you post. You want to do your best to tailor your content to the audience.
What Are My Competitors Doing On Social Media
A great way to generate new ideas and inspiration is to simply follow your competitors. Keep tabs on their strategies and use what works for them on your own content. Competitive research is a key part to any successful marketing strategy.
What Types of Content Do I Want To Post
Sit down and list out all the types of content you want to post and any ideas you have for future content. If you’re stuck, an easy way to create new ideas is to look at your past content and find bits that can be condensed into a single graphic.
I also like to generate post templates that I can reuse multiple times. For example, for a fitness related product I was working on, the team created an exercise spotlight template. This highlights one specific exercise and has a few lines of text around it. Then, all we have to do is swap out the text and image and we’re good to go. If you can create a few templates you can have tons of easy to make content without it feeling overly repetitive.
How Often Should I Post
You also want to start with a schedule of when/what you want to post. The general advice here is to go for quality over quantity, there’s enough junk out there already so try not to contribute to it. Good content is much more likely to stand out anyways, and makes the effort put into it well worth it.
This is a personal choice and you should take into account how much time you can dedicate each week. Posting everyday is a great goal, but if that’s too much try 2-3 times per week to start. It’s much better to post 3 times per week and have it be 3 really good posts than to create 7 meh pieces of content.
Outside of this, you should also be setting goals. I set SMART goals around all my social media marketing endeavors and they help keep me on track.
Once you have all of the above down you can start setting up a social media calendar. We’ll be looking at that a bit more in depth in another article. In essence though, your calendar should cover what you're posting, when you’re posting it, and what state it’s in. In simple cases you could use a spreadsheet to track this, but there are full blown software solutions available as well for more complex uses.
Post Consistently
This is a quick tip, but no less important. Once you start posting on social media try your best to stay consistent. If you pick Monday-Wednesday-Friday as your posting days then try not to miss a post on those days.
Staying consistent is a huge factor in your overall success. So many people complain about not seeing results on social media, but then have a haphazard posting schedule and plan. Make sure you have a solid plan in place, and do your best to stay on top of it.
Expand Your Content
Many social media sites have multiple types of content you can post, and expanding the type of content you create can help you reach more people. Instagram for example has stories that are short videos separate from your main posts, and Facebook has a similar feature.
These present opportunities to expand yourself, and create entirely new bits of content. A great tip here is to repurpose older content; for example, turning a graphic image into a short video clip that explains it.
There’s no hard requirement here on when/what types of content you should be expanding to, but keep these opportunities open as an option. They are a great way to reach new people, and can often be relatively low effort.
Engage With Your Audience
Many people forget that social media is meant to be a social experience. For you, that means making sure you’re staying engaged with your audience and with others in your niche.
At a basic level, this means responding to comments and messages you get in a timely manner. It really helps show who you are and lets people know that there’s a real person behind the posts. Showing a bit of the human side behind the screen is a great way to start building relationships which lead to deeper engagement from your audience.
To take it a step further, you can also start reaching out to others in your niche. Consistently commenting on others posts as well as messaging them directly is a great way to get your name out there. This is especially true when just starting out and when your organic reach is at its lowest. Don’t be afraid to start conversations, it’s one of the best ways to get over those initial growth hurdles.
Using Scheduling Software
Lastly, I just wanted to briefly touch on using scheduling software as these can make your life a whole lot easier. Most of these allow you to schedule posts out ahead of time, as well as to post to multiple platforms in one go.
My personal favorite is Later, and I’ve saved countless hours using it. I have no affiliation with them, and they have a free version that gives you a limited amount of posts per month. I highly encourage you to go check them out as it’s a huge time saver.
There are other platforms too, so if Later doesn’t fit you there are plenty of other options. I’d say anyone serious about social media should be using one of these platforms as it’s just a gigantic time saver and being able to schedule a post does wonders for staying consistent.
Final Thoughts
Social media can be tricky but is well worth the effort. Nearly any market you can imagine has a presence on social media sites, and that should excite you as a business owner. We’ll be creating additional content for social media marketing so stay tuned. In the meantime, if you have any questions feel free to reach out to use on social media, the links to our platforms are in the footer.