Getting The Most Out Of Social Media
82% of buyers trust a company that is active socially
Research has shown that buyers trust a company more when they are active across social media. Not only does this benefit the buyer, but developing a social media presence is also reflected in your social media rankings. This means that if there is a specific action you want your users to take, such as signing up to a mailing list, listening to your latest podcast, or even making a purchase, you’d be more successful directing them to your website from social media.
The point being, when your social media presence has so much influence over your search engine rankings, website traffic and overall reputation, it’s important to know how you’re performing on these platforms. To do this, you need analytics.
Before you start looking through the extensive analytics available on social media platforms, you need to ensure you have clearly defined business goals – when you know what you’re looking to achieve, you know what metrics are most important to you. For example:
- If your goal is building awareness, look at impressions and reach
- If your goal is connecting with your audience, look at likes, retweets, comments, shares and engagement rate
- If your goal is sales, look at your click through rate whilst incorporating Google Analytics for even more information. From this, you can see where your website visitors are coming from, if it’s social, you can see which social. Not only would this tell you which platform you should be putting your time and effort into, but also it could show a significant increase after you’ve implemented a new campaign, for example, which lets you know what works and what doesn’t.
With social media, you’re able to monitor any and all customer feedback, for example any comments made on your content or about your business in general. You can see here what they’re saying about your company, giving you the opportunity in turn to speak to them directly and answer any questions. Regardless of whether this feedback is positive or negative, always respond to it. Negative comments have even more of an impact when they’re ignored by a business, but if you respond professionally and offer solutions to the problem, potential customers are less likely to be put off.
When considering social media from a business perspective, it’s important to know how it could support the organisation’s goals – by understanding the capabilities of each platform. Overall, social media can help you reach a huge, global audience, grow organically as well as drive website traffic.
Finally, it’s important to choose the right social media platform for you, to ensure your marketing efforts here are relevant and reach the right people. See our recent blog on which social media platform is best for your business, for more information. In summary:
- Facebook: for creating meaningful interactions; useful for Retail, Hospitality and Fashion
- Instagram: provide exceptional visual content and create networks / groups through hashtags; useful for Food & Drink, Interiors and E-commerce
- Twitter: creating a community through “networking hours”, finding where your target audience are all talking and what they’re talking about; useful for Customer Service, Education and PR
- LinkedIn: connecting in a professional way, particularly successful if you’re a B2B company; useful for Recruitment, Marketing and IT
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