Social Media Tips – Posting Like a Boss to Increase Your Social Reach and Engagement

How to Rock Your Social Marketing

Do you ever get the feeling there is too much social media? Everything and everyone seems to be on social media these days, and the result is overwhelming! Luckily you can ignore 90% of social content; it is simply digital noise. If you want to succeed at social media you need to rise above the noise and post like a boss. Our social media tips will show you how!

You probably heard this before: social media is where you need to be when it comes to promoting your small business. Social media increases public awareness of your brand, builds a connection between your brand and your consumers, and improves your search engine ranking.

But how exactly can you achieve any of these results if you’re just starting out with social media marketing?  I understand that starting out feels like an uphill battle for most small business owners. The best way is to start now, remain consistent and be patient.

So what can you do this very second to improve your social presence? Keep reading for six social media tips you can act on today. Yes, really! Why not try this for yourself?

6 Social Media Tips

Tip 1: Don’t Be Everywhere

One or two consistent social profiles have greater value than being inconsistent across too many social platforms. So ditch the ones that are not relevant to your brand, target audience, or social marketing objectives. Not sure how to decide on which social profiles to keep? Here are some thoughts:

Does hardly anyone read your blog, but people love your Pinterest boards? Then you should focus your efforts on Pinterest. Do people ignore your updates on Facebook, but retweet and like your posts on Twitter? Stick to Twitter. Do folks ignore you on Snapchat, but love your Instagram feed? Then focus on that instead.

Want so more in-depth data? This Pew Research Center study shows the demographics of each social media network. Here are some facts you may want to consider:

• Women are more likely to use Facebook than men and it’s a popular network for seniors.
• Women are more likely to use Facebook than men and it’s a popular network for seniors.
• Twitter is primarily used by people under 50 who are college educated.
• Instagram users are mostly women and young adults ages 18-29.
• Pinterest is dominated by women and somewhat popular with young people. The over 50 crowd is slowly growing their interest in Pinterest as well.
• LinkedIn is a hot spot for college graduates and higher income households.

A Quick Note About Google+

Google’s attempts to create their own social media platform never quite met with expectations. Initially touted as the alternative to Facebook Google+ never reached a high adoption rate, and the platform continued to linger for years. After repeated data breaches in 2018 Google announced it was shutting down Google+ ahead of schedule.

Tip 2: Develop a Social Media Strategy

Exactly what kind of results do you need from your social media marketing? You need to answer this question before you can develop your social media strategy. Without one, you are pretty much going to waste your time and efforts on social media.

So what do you want to achieve? Are you hoping to gain brand awareness? Do you want people to click-through to your website? Do you want to grow your list of sales leads? Choose your main goal and always keep it in mind when you develop content.

A very important aspect of our social media tips is to focus on your audience. Social media is not about you; it is all about your audience. You must find out what your audience wants to see. If you have no clue, check out the feeds of your followers and competitors. Analyze what they post to see what has people talking and what doesn’t.

Another of our social media tips is to conduct a survey of your audience. Personally, I recommend SurveyMonkey. It is very simple to create a survey, poll your audience, and evaluate the results. Of course, you can always ask questions directly on your social profiles as well.

Finally, develop a social media calendar to plan your posts. Social media dashboard platforms like HootSuite, Buffer, Agorapulse, SproutSocial, and Commun.It can greatly simplify your social media efforts. Even better, many of these have free and/or low-cost options perfect for small business budgets.

Tip 3: Be Social

This is one of the most important social media tips. Social media is like having a conversation. Sure, this sounds simple, but it’s something small business owners often overlook. Don’t believe me? The number of abandoned small business social media accounts says differently.

Unless you are already a well-known brand building a social following requires consistent interaction and engagement. So start engaging with your followers and your target audience. Subscribe to feeds, leave thoughtful comments on blogs, retweet posts and share other brand’s content. Once you start doing that others are more likely to do the same for you.

Tip 4: Provide Value

Remember, social media is not about you; it is about everyone else! Are most of your social media posts related to your business? You need to stop that right now. If your posts are primarily self-serving, you run the risk of rapidly losing your audience. And that is not a good thing!

A much better way is to share information that is of benefit to your target audience. Most people go out of their way to share, like, comment, or otherwise engage on information that they feel is valuable, especially when it comes from your business blog.

However, be sure not to make your content appear overly promotional or sales oriented. Instead, you should focus on increasing engagement and driving your social followers to your small business website. Once you get your social audience to that stage you are much more likely to convert them into consumers.

Tip 5: Be Visual

Another of our social media tips is to focus on visual content for your social marketing. Studies have shown that visual content such as images, infographics, and video have much higher engagement rates than text content only. So start visual storytelling!

Not sure how to do that? There are a number of free tools, including Adobe Express, Ripl, Canva and PicMonkey to help you create and edit images for your social media marketing. Many offer free templates for social media images which make designing a breeze.

Need images to get started? There are a number of stock photo sites that are affordable for even the smallest business. Adobe Stock will give you 10 images for free. Here are some additional free stock photo options for you to consider.

Tip 6: Get Social Media Help

The last of our social media tips is not do this on your own. Small business social media marketing takes a constant effort. For most small business owners it may be helpful to have someone on your team who has an interest in social media to manage your social accounts.

If you don’t have the manpower or someone with the right experience, consider contracting a social media expert to help you. Ask for referrals from people in your network or browse LinkedIn to find reputable social media managers with testimonials and proven results.

Getting Started on Social Media

Every small business has to start somewhere with their social media marketing efforts. Some never quite get the hang of it and give up. Others become quite successful at social media marketing. If you can put in a little elbow grease, you can gain traction and get results sooner than you think.

So take it one step at a time. An organic social media following doesn’t grow overnight. But with effort, your business will start to make a mark on social media. Keep in mind the worst thing you can do is let your accounts go dormant. Stay consistent and stay engaged and your presence is bound to pick up steam.

To help you get started, check out our social media starter kit for business owners, learn which social media strategy errors you better avoid, and how to use social media as a marketing tool. What are you waiting for? Go and get social; your audience is waiting!

Did You Try Our Social Media Tips?

After reading our post did you implement any of our social media tips? Or try out one of the mentioned social media management tools? How did it work for you? Did you notice an increase in social media followers or engagement? If you did not try any of these social media tips, what was the main reason? Feel free to contact us and let us know, and we will consider adding to our post.

Can you think of any other social media tips for small businesses? Please let us know so our audience can benefit as well, and grab our feed so you don’t miss our next post! And help your audience become better social media marketers by sharing these social media tips with them!

Thanks; we appreciate you helping us spread the word! Stay highly caffeinated!

By Gregor Schmidt Co-Founder / Creative Technologist @gregorspeaks