So we started with teaching you how to streamline your website to convert more leads into customers, gave you The Smart SEO Checklist for Beginners to get your brand to the top of search engine results for more business. Part 3 of our Web Marketing Fundamentals is something that you’re probably using every single day. As a small business owner you should utilise Social Media because this tool evens out the playing field with your bigger competitors. 

On ground activations are awesome, but as HubSpot’s Inbound Marketing Annual Report confirms, social media can get you almost double the marketing leads versus trade shows and telemarketing.

Social Media won’t discriminate between you and business Goliaths—it only takes good, applicable strategies to leverage this technology to your benefit. But are you using it to its full potential?

Make it a killer year for your business and get more brand followers.  Click on to read our top tips.

Avago now.

Social Media is one of the most hardworking tools to boost your small business—if you aren’t on any social networking sites, you’re missing out on generating more leads and strengthening your customer base. Leaving your mark socially makes for big opportunities for visibility, brand relevance, and customer engagement.

FACEBOOK

Check your page’s Analytics. Go to your page and look to the upper portion of your Admin Panel and click on the “See Insights” page. Use this page regularly to see which posts get your page the most engagement, and which types of content are most effective in getting your brand messaging across.

Measuring clicks, conversions, activity, and many other metrics will help you understand your fans. This will act as a springboard for better and more engaging content, as well as opportunities to reach out to your customer base. You can also monitor your Facebook marketing efforts through other third-party services.

Try out Sponsored Stories to get more visibility for your posts, especially if you are running a special promotion for your products. With Facebook’s Sponsored Stories ads, your posts won’t be overwhelmed by the barrage of updates in your fans’ news feed. And since these ads will have actual live activity from your fans’ friends, they won’t come across as a sales pitch and will have social proof instead of the usual ad copy.

TWITTER

Never treat Twitter as a place where you constantly broadcast advertisements as they can turn off people pretty quickly. Rather, treat it as a marketing tool that sells not your products, but your band personality for greater one-on-one engagement. Check out Twitter’s basics for small businesses if you want a quick primer.

Here are some quick tips to help you get more involved with your online community and use Twitter more effectively:

1. Check your page.

Are you using the generic background? You should customize your page RIGHT NOW. A little personality goes a long way.

Remember that this is a page that represents your small business. Make the most out of this real estate and place contact details, any current offers, or nice photos on your Twitter page’s background. Make sure to update your description as well. You can even place a Call to Action prominently on your page if you want people to follow you, AND THEN do something else to strengthen your following. It could be a call to view a seasonal promotion, grab a helpful downloadable guide, or register for a free sampling kit.

2. Research hashtags that apply to your small business and your locale.

Anything trending? Ride the publicity and contribute your own take on the issue. You can curate (or produce!) helpful content around each hashtag and make a content cache for future tweets.

3. Join industry and topic Twitter lists related to your business and get chatting on a regular basis.

If someone is looking for a resource you cannot provide but know of, spread the love by referring other businesses and tag them so that they know where that lead came from. Check regularly and respond to any industry-related tweets. Don’t forget to follow trendsetters, experts, competitors, and thought leaders in your industry so you are always in the loop!

4. People love visuals.

If you have interesting photos, go ahead and share them. Travelling and inspired? Share scenic shots with a nice quote. If some photos are applicable, you can even link them to content (your blog, articles about hot topics), or even use them for promotions on Twitter.

5. Keep it real, all the time!

Be authentic, and don’t be afraid to let your audience know who you are, what you think, how you feel. Don’t engage followers just because you are looking to do business. Be genuinely interested in your followers, and take real effort to be helpful even if it does not benefit you directly. Good vibes goes a long way.

LINKEDIN

Get LinkedIn for Business as it is a powerful networking tool, as well as a bonzer engagement platform for your small business’ announcements, events, updates, and fresh content. It’s useful for content marketing and helps with SEO rankings.

Use this network for a professional small business identity by engaging prospects and sharing company posts and relevant business blogs. Make sure to tailor fit your offerings, announcements, and target content to specific groups of interest by harnessing the power of LinkedIn’s targeted updates (honing in on a subset of followers based on geography, industry, company size). This will increase quality conversations between you and your audience, may it be another small business or a prospective customer.

If you’re running a campaign for a specific market, extend your reach by opting for LinkedIn Advertising and set ads. Maximise your budget by fine tuning your targeting, adding a powerful image and effective copy, and doing A/B testing on these to see which ads get you the best bang for your buck. 

And show them you mean business! Your audiences are professionals, and most of the demographic is composed of decision makers. So complete your profile and feature what your business has to offer. The text here is SEO-friendly, so update your descriptions so that they are keyword-rich and focuses on your expertise.

How about you?

Do you have any good Social Media tips to share? Let us know in the comments below and share this post if you liked it! Stay tuned for next week’s fresh Email Marketing Tips, number 4 in our Fundamentals for Web Marketing Series.

Ta muchly! And see you real soon. 🙂

Ink splat,

INKABLE