In a world dominated by technology, utilizing online platforms to promote a brand is key if you want to stay relevant in 2022. Social media allows businesses an outlet to share everything from details on upcoming sales, new product releases, and other trending content with their target audience.
Additionally, given how easy it is to share content from page to page, social media also provides an organic means of spreading the word on what you offer. While paid ads on these platforms can yield great results, that doesn’t mean you still can’t successfully market a brand without paying for advertisements. Below are some tips on how you can grow your social media presence without actually using ads on these platforms.
Utilize Analytics to Find Your Target Audience
Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram all have their own analytics tracking capabilities that allow users to monitor their performance. When using social media to market a brand, make sure you keep tabs on these analytics for your profile.
Analytics provide valuable insight into who is viewing your content, making it a great way to determine if you’re actually reaching the intended audience. Analytics can also give you an idea of what type of content fairs best on your page as well as what the best times to post are.
Engage with Your Audience Often
People want to feel like the brands they shop are actively listening to their consumers. Simply responding to consumer questions or creating content that they can interact with, like polls, on social media, is a great way to keep people engaged in your content.
For those just discovering your page on social media, seeing your frequent interactions with followers can also encourage others to try your products, since they know you care about what your audience has to say.
Optimize Your Social Media Pages
When it comes to social media pages, you want to ensure they’re easy to find for potential customers looking to research your brand. Since around 76% of consumers purchase products after seeing them on social media, it’s not hard to see why making your page as visible as possible can pay off.
Use relevant keywords in your content whenever possible and make sure your business website is linked to your social media page and easy to access. Additionally, make sure your profile photo is a clear image of your logo and your page title is the name of your business so people looking for you on social media can easily locate your page.
Post Content that Appeals to Your Audience
Make sure the content you post on your business’ social media pages is in line with what appeals to your target audience.
It may take a bit of trial and error in the beginning, but if you’re utilizing analytics and checking which of your posts are getting the most attention, you should be able to figure out what content your consumers want to see from you. It can also be helpful to take a look at your competitors’ pages to see what they’re posting and what content is getting the most attention on their social media.
Always Add Visual Content to Your Posts
People love video content and spend 88% more time on websites that feature videos over text-only content. Videos are easy to spot, eye-catching, and are more likely to catch a user’s attention while scrolling through their feed.
As an added bonus, video content receives a staggering 1200% more shares than any other form of visual content online!
Even if you don’t have videos to add to your posts, use photos instead – never post plain text content without some type of visuals.
Use Hashtags and Tagging on Your Content
Tagging and hashtags are a quick, easy way to get exposure for your posted content on social media platforms. Users that may have otherwise never viewed your page have a greater chance of seeing your content. Encouraging users to tag others in your posts is also a great way to improve visibility and grow.
When using hashtags, just remember not to overdo it as too many can jeopardize the integrity of your posts.
Never Buy Followers to Appear More Popular
While it may be tempting to just purchase a large amount of fake followers to make a brand seem bigger than it is online, this is a massive mistake for several reasons.
Buying robot accounts to follow your business page will make it more difficult to differentiate real followers from false ones. Additionally, if it’s discovered that you paid for dummy accounts to follow your pages, it will seriously damage your authority as a brand and make consumers less likely to trust your business.
Stay Active on Social Media
If you want a business page on social media to succeed with your target audience, you have to stay active on these platforms. Simply making an account and forgetting about it will do nothing to help you gain traction on social media.
Post 1-2 times a day if possible. If you’re having trouble managing multiple social media accounts, utilize tools like Buffer to manage all your profiles in a single place.
Make Your Social Media Content Mobile-Friendly
When people are logging into their social media accounts, 9 times out of 10 they’re using their cellphones to do it. That’s why it’s so important to always optimize your content online for smaller devices like phones and tablets.
Some ways you can do this is by ensuring your profile picture as well as all other visual content looks good on mobile phones. In addition to ensuring your social media is mobile-friendly, you’ll also want to make sure your business website is optimized for mobile so that when users decide to click on the link to your page, they enjoy the same easy-to-view content.
