Social media has become a critical part of every business strategy. Gone are the days of advertising seen only on highway billboards and the back of newspapers. In a world consumed with smartphones and portable computers, you absolutely need to be marketing on social media. Nowadays, it’s the most effective way to connect with people and grow your brand.
As a business marketer, you should always be paying attention to your customers and how they are using social media platforms. This might include which platforms visitors are using most often, the accounts they follow, and their interests. All of this information will take some research, but it would be worth it considering the audience you could potentially reach.
If you’re thinking that you don’t need a social media account or that you’ve “gotten along just fine for years without one”… well, you need to rethink your strategy. The most recent digital global snapshot from July 21, 2020 shows that more than half of the world uses social media. That’s 3.96 billion people since July 2020! More than half of the world doesn’t have the capacity to view your local ad or see your business on a billboard. It’s also not guaranteed that people will see your website just because it exists. Social media is truly your best chance of connecting with new people and growing your business.
The problem at hand is figuring out what to post on social media to get visitors and how to convert your visitors into customers. This might be the biggest head-scratcher of the century. It’s much easier said than done because you’re trying to appeal to your audience by posting the right things.
Our advice? Don’t overthink it! First, establish your audience. Once you know this information, research your audience’s interests and recent searches. This will help you create advertising that appeals to those specific people, in turn, drawing more people to your website.
If you’re unsure of what to post, you’re feeling uninspired, or just don’t know where to start, then keep reading! We’ve got a few ideas that will help spice up your social media platforms and increase your customer base.
Studies show that over 40% of people will unfollow a brand on social media if they think the information isn’t relevant to them. Almost 50% of people unfollow a brand because they post too much and almost 20% of people unfollow a brand because it doesn’t post enough. That might leave you thinking, “What am I supposed to do?” Before posting on social media, it would be worth your time to learn about each platform and how it’s used.
- Sends more website referral traffic than any other social media network
- Shows both news and entertainment
- Video content is prevalent
- It’s both a social network and a news platform
- A great platform for brands sharing blog posts or promoting website content
- A completely visual network for static images
- Not the greatest place for driving blog or website traffic
- Great for brands that are very visual
- Strong imagery and highly visual
- Many people use to find inspiration for projects
- This is a very professional network
- Meant for sharing industry articles and professional content
Now that you know the different social media platforms available, choose a few platforms that apply to your business and create a social media calendar. In your calendar, you should try to plan your posts at least a month ahead of time. Creating a calendar will help you stay on track with your posting schedule. It allows you to visually see what you are posting and when you are posting it. A calendar makes it possible to plan and promote social media content in one place.
If you’re struggling with what to post to social media and when… we’ve got 10 ideas to get you started!
- Post your articles
One of the hardest things about creating content is actually figuring out what content to create. You may be thinking, “What should I write about?”
Well thankfully, the topics are unlimited! Think about your brand and what parts of your brand may appeal to others. If you’re consistently writing articles, make sure to share them on all of your social media platforms. Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin are the best areas to post articles. Posting your articles on social media will initiate more clicks, draw more visitors to your website, and get more people knowing who you are.
- Create a Poll
Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are all great places to poll your website visitors. The awesome thing about polls is that it encourages your visitors to engage with your content! You can poll your visitors on really anything you want. It could be a poll about how they feel about a new product you’re releasing to their favorite ice cream flavor! Overall, the polls will help you gain thoughtful information about your followers that will be useful when creating new products.
- Share photos of your coworkers or employees
Show off the people who make the company possible! Think about it! It would be a win-win situation. Your customers would get the chance to see the faces behind the company while your business highlights the good work of each individual employee/ coworker. Posting about your coworkers would also give your visitors a chance to see what’s going on behind the scenes and learn about the products they are consuming. Studies show that pictures with faces get 38% more likes. You don’t need to post about one of your co-workers/ employees every day. Instead, focus on highlighting an achievement or recognizing a co-worker on your social media every once in a while. Also, depending on the size of your business, you may have lots of opportunities to post about employees!
- Post about new products
Use your social media as a way to hype up new products that you are releasing. You can choose to advertise before your product officially releases or advertise even after your products have been released. Either way, you’ll be gaining more traction on your products and you’ll have unlimited content to post! It’s a great way to advertise, yet still create fun content to post.
- Share Company Accomplishments
Has your business/brand accomplished something really big recently? Maybe your brand was featured in a news article or maybe you won a prestigious award! If so, share that exciting accomplishment with your customers and website visitors. There’s no need to be humble when it comes to your business on social media. Sharing your accomplishments only increase your credibility and allows others to share in that excitement with you!
- Inspirational Quotes
Inspirational quotes never get old… (as long as you don’t post them every day!) Adding an Inspirational quote into your mix of content might be the refreshing touch that your audience wants to see! The great thing about inspirational quotes is that there’s an unlimited amount of them. Find a quote that’s relevant to your brand or marketing strategy and stick to posting those every once in a while. You’d simply need to run a quick Google search to find some inspiration. You could also draw some inspiration from social media sites like Pinterest or Instagram.
- Share upcoming event information
Regardless of this unfortunate year, if your business is hosting any upcoming events, make sure to market them on social media. It’s especially important to post about your upcoming events if you don’t host events very often! As you may already know, social media is the best way to promote your business. Why not promote an event that encourages your customers and other website visitors to be a part of it? Even if you’re hosting a virtual event, it would be worth it to post about it on your social media! It gives your customers an idea of what you’re doing and it helps build the anticipation of future events.
- Giveaways
Who doesn’t love free things, right? This is the perfect place to run a giveaway because your post will most likely be exposed to so many people! Giveaways are always a great idea because it has the potential to expand your target audience and following on social media. It’s a great way for new visitors to learn about your brand and share it with their friends. You will likely gain many new likes and follows from this effort!
- How-To posts
Sharing “how-to’s” can be extremely helpful for your business. If you’re releasing a product that requires help learning how to use it, then create a how-to video or article that goes with it. You could even make how-to videos or write articles that describe how to use something outside of your products and services. Sharing helpful content will make you a credible source in your area of expertise and will organically increase your visitors by the day. The more content you create, the more you will be viewed as a trusted and credible source in your business and brand.
- Testimonials / Customer Reviews
Adding either one of these will add immense credibility to your brand and your website. Testimonials and customer reviews are insanely impactful because they are true testaments of your brand from somebody else’s eyes. All you’d need to do is post a picture of one of your products and use a testimonial or a review as the caption. Your caption will be much more powerful, as the words are coming from somebody else.