Social media marketing, as the term suggests, is an electronic or rather digital marketing strategy that leverages social media. Individuals or businesses create content that their audience can relate to. The purpose behind creating content is to enhance engagement on their social media profiles. But what good is engagement on social media? Let me list the answers for you.
- It creates a positive brand image.
- Helps brands enhance their online presence.
- Creates brand awareness.
- Promotes brand loyalty among the users and creates a sense of community.
- Lastly, it ultimately leads to more conversions and sustainable business growth.
The Beginning of Social Media Marketing
It is common knowledge that by the late 80’s, computers had become increasingly common. This was also the time when technology was becoming increasingly sophisticated. By the end of the ’90s, 1997 to be exact, the first social media platform, Six Degrees, was introduced. Much like social media platforms now, Six Degree also allowed users to create profiles, upload profile pictures, and befriend others. It was at this point that several blogging sites like Open Diary started gaining popularity, this started an online phenomenon that people still love today. Marketers began to notice the popularity of social media, and it was not long before social media was transformed into a retail platform and marketing tool. The phenomenon that first began as a form of electronic communication and virtual community gathering turned into a marketing tool within a generation.
However, the social media market became as we know it today after the brainchild of Mark Zuckerberg was made available to everyone. Facebook, known as The Facebook back when it was launched in 2004 for university students, gained instant popularity. This landed them a $500,000 investment from Peter Thiel, the founder of PayPal. Facebook then expanded its network to the general public in 2006, and by October, it had garnered 50 million users. Only a month after that, Facebook Ads were launched. This marked the beginning of social media marketing as we know it today.
Why Should You Use Social Media Marketing?
There are several reasons why you should leverage social media marketing for your business. Here are some of the most beneficial ones.
Increases Brand Awareness
Do you know how many users Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube have collectively? These three social media platforms have a collective user count of 7.52 billion users. Surprising right? This also means that if you are not leveraging social media marketing to promote your business, you are missing out on the potential of reaching thousands, if not millions.
SMM gives you the opportunity to meet potential customers where they are. It is a great way to increase brand awareness. The best way to increase brand awareness using social media is by creating content your audience can relate to. This drives engagement in the form of likes, shares, and comments. You can also direct these users to your website by including the link to your website in your profile, posts, and bio.
Generates Leads
Once you have steady engagement on your social media profiles, you can start generating leads and boost conversions. Promoting your products/ services on social media by creating engaging content is a great way to generate leads. Some strategies you can use in this regard are as follows:
- Create contests for your users to participate in. One such contest can be for the best user generated content. The user that creates the best content then gets an exclusive offer or a product.
- Create Offers and include them in your bio and posts. These offers can be for a specific day like Independence Day. Not only that, you can also create limited time offers that your social media audience can take advantage of.
- Create a proper SMM campaign. The best way to do this is by having a clear end goal in mind. The end goal can be to boost conversions, drive traffic, or enhance engagement.
- Consider SM as an e-commerce platform. You should leverage online shops offered by these social media platforms to sell or promote your products/services. Facebook offers a Facebook Marketplace for businesses and individuals to sell their products. Similarly, you can use Instagram’s shopping feature and TikTok shop to boost sales.
Foster Client Relationships
If you do not foster healthy relationships with your audience, you lose out on the opportunity to create brand advocates. You need to consider social media as a form of two way communication with your customers. You can not just publish content and ignore your audience’s feedback and queries. Always make sure you are acknowledging your audience by replying to their comments or queries. Plus, you should also provide great customer service even on social media platforms. This helps your audience feel valued, and your brand be more trustworthy in the eyes of not only your customers but also users who stumble across your social media profiles. When you do that and acknowledge your audience, you not only create loyal customers but brand advocates as well. Brand advocates are those loyal customers who not only prefer using your products and services but also promote them to others. And as you already know, the best marketing is through word of mouth.
Final Thoughts
SMM, at its core, is a marketing strategy that helps build brand awareness and ultimately boost sales and conversions. Social media marketing has become a necessity for brands and businesses worldwide. You lose the golden opportunity to reach your target market if you are not leveraging the power of social media marketing. However, this means the competition on social media is also fierce. You only have a few seconds to capture the attention of your desired audience. So, how can you effectively leverage SMM to create brand awareness? The best way to do this is by hiring a social media marketer/strategist to create a strategy to meet your SMM objectives.
If you are a business owner looking to leverage social media to enhance brand awareness, this is your lucky day. Contact us now, and our social media marketing experts will help you achieve your marketing objectives.
