3. Use Social Media Personally
As a businessperson, you may feel that you don’t have time to engage with social media on a personal level, and you only interact with it while using it for marketing purposes. However, doing so may be a mistake that’s costing you. If you’re posting on social media for your business, you need to be consistently using social media on a personal basis.
Many businesses are missing the mark when it comes to successful social media, and the key reason is that they are approaching it like traditional marketing and not from the viewpoint of the user. Anyone on your team that has the power to influence your social media marketing must interact with social media personally daily. You would never sell a product that you yourself haven’t used and can attest to its value; why would you create content if you’re not a content consumer as well? Pencil in time to unwind on Instagram or TikTok and try your best to approach it with a consumer mindset, not a marketer’s mindset.
In using social media apps, you will not only keep up with trends that your company could follow, but you will also be able to gain priceless insights from your customer base by seeing how they interact with competitors or even other businesses in different industries. Your algorithm will become personalized the more you use these apps. With that, you will pick up on what makes social media marketing successful. You’ll soon begin to notice how bad social media marketing sticks out like a sore thumb. Finding success on social media can sometimes be as simple as jumping in at the right time or understanding the hard-to-describe “it” factor.
4. Make The Jump To Tiktok
TikTok has over 1 billion monthly active users and counting, with the average use time being around 90 minutes a day. With impressive statistics like this, it’s surprising that many businesses are slow to make the jump over to TikTok for their marketing efforts.
Brands are seeing immense growth on TikTok and are even tapping into new audiences completely organically. In fact, it’s likely you may already have supporters on TikTok, who are ready to support and engage with your content as soon as you join. While TikTok is a favorite of Gen-Z, they are not the only users of the app. In fact, the vast majority (73%) of users are between the ages of 18-35.
Nearly half of Gen-Z is using TikTok for search instead of Google, according to Google’s own data. On top of that, not only is TikTok’s algorithm powerful, but its SEO is huge with tens of millions of searches per day. By simply having a presence on TikTok, your brand awareness could increase exponentially, bringing with it more valuable and genuine social listening than you’ll even know what to do with!
Do you have to dance to be on TikTok? Absolutely not. In 2023, social media is trending toward being more about the value it brings to the consumer rather than purely entertainment factor. This means that you could create content that highlights your products, your brand story, and behind-the-scenes footage of your facilities without anyone on your team ever having to learn a single dance move. That being said, keeping your finger on the pulse of what is trending will give you a leg-up on TikTok, but that doesn’t mean you have to participate in every single trend, either.
5. Use The Resources You Have
You may be a small operation, but when it comes to marketing on social media if you want to do it well, it might be all hands on deck. A few years ago, a small business could easily manage and maintain its social media accounts with just one person handling it part-time. In 2023, social media marketing is likely going to require more energy and brainpower than before. The best way to tackle this challenge without getting overwhelmed is to utilize the resources you already have.
Now that you’re ready to start making video content, you might realize it can be a big undertaking. If filming video content seems daunting to you, try and use the resources available to you to simplify it. Use your phone to film and don’t worry about doing any flashy editing to start off with. Contrary to popular belief, your content does not have to be perfect or polished to be worth posting, especially when you’re just starting out. People will find less-than-perfect content to be more authentic and relatable anyways, so don’t let that stop you from getting started.
Maybe you already have product photos or instructional videos that you’re using. Great! You can repurpose those in a new and fresh way on social media. No need to go through the process all over again if you already have assets that can be refreshed. This will also help free up the time it might take for thinking up new content.
If your business is more than just you, try and get your other team members involved to help think of ideas and create. Even if you don’t have other team members, you could always try and involve friends, family, or even your VIP customers! You’d be surprised by the valuable ideas people can offer or even how willing they might be to help you. A video of a customer’s testimonial can be a really powerful marketing tool.
6. Go Live
In 2023, social media live streaming is going to continue to be a great marketing strategy for brands. Nearly all social media platforms now have live streaming capabilities including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok. Customers love to tune in to live streams because they don’t want to miss out on something exciting that might be happening, or they might want to use that opportunity to ask questions. For businesses, this is a great real-time feedback system and customer touchpoint.
Live streaming is also great for brand reputation. By going live, you are building trust with your customers. You are also humanizing your brand and showing how authentic you can be. This kind of brand reputation building is hard to come by any other way. You can connect with your existing customers and expand your reach at the same time.
Try planning out consistent times to go live and let your followers know when you’ll be doing it. Use that time for customer Q&A, unboxing new merchandise, or educating customers on a new product or service. You can even surprise your viewers and reward them with a special coupon code for viewing, incentivizing them to join again next time.