When you work from home, building your business’s social media presence is essential. Sure, home-working brings you the benefit of peace and quiet (and the option to work in your pyjamas), but working from home can also mean that you’re not out there meeting your clients, customers and colleagues face-to-face. And those key relationships are crucial to your success – whatever your business. But don’t worry, the beauty of social media is that you can build successful relationships to benefit your business without even leaving the house.
So how do you go about conquering the world of social media? With so many platforms and so much online noise out there, how do you make yourself heard? Try these five ways to build up your business’s social presence from scratch – and make sure you don’t fade into digital obscurity…
Choose the right platforms for your audience
Before you start anything, you need to think about who you are trying to reach on social media. Are you trying to reach other businesses? Sell to a certain demographic? Search for jobs? Knowing your audience will help you target your posts at the right people.
Once you know who your audience is, you need to get to know them. What are their needs? How do they use social media? Which other brands do they follow? Knowing where they hang out in the world of social media, and how they like to engage and interact, will give you a good idea of how to appeal to them. A good example of this is a site that invests in residential real estate by purchasing straight from the seller.
Don’t worry about building a presence on every single social media platform in the beginning. Better to choose a few key platforms and do them really well. If you’re searching for jobs, platforms like LinkedIn and BranchOut are popular. If you want to get chatting with your audience go for Twitter and Facebook. And if you love sharing photos or videos check out Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube. There is an ever-increasing number of platforms to choose from so go with one or two that suit you best!
Put the ‘social’ in social media
Social media is a two-way street. Your aim should be to build relationships and interact with your audience. Think about ways that you can provide value to them without asking for anything in return. For example, share tips, offer advice and share your knowledge without worrying about selling your products or services. This will help you establish yourself as an authority in your area of business, which builds trust with potential customers.
It’s all too easy to get obsessed with the number of likes and followers you have. Try instead to focus on building up a group of engaged followers. A smaller number of followers who genuinely care about your business, and are likely to share and like your content, is far more valuable to your business than hordes of lukewarm followers. So invest in your social media relationships by commenting on other people’s content, replying when people like or share your content, and responding to any questions or complaints quickly and warmly. Lush Hair Extensions do this really well through their Twitter account. Yes, this takes time, but it’s so important and will pay dividends in the long run.
Make sure your social media is visible
This is a really easy way to make sure as many people as possible come across your social media. Add your social media icons to your website homepage, your email signature, guest blog posts, flyers, posters, and business cards – and make them prominent! You can link back to your website from your social media profiles so all areas of your online presence are linked.
You also want to optimise your social presence by adding relevant keywords to your social media profiles and content. This means that when people search social media for keywords related to your business, your brand has a better chance of standing out. Connecting with the big accounts in your business’s area and sharing their content is also a great way of optimising your profile as this will be seen by the followers of those businesses.
Aim high with your content
The best social presence strategy in the world is not going to work unless you have great content. Whether you’re creating or sharing content, keep in mind the goal of bringing the best possible content to your audience. That definitely means no spammy click-bait articles and no endless reams of self-promotion.
Social media is the place to share the human side of your business. Let your audience go behind-the-scenes, share your dreams and successes, link to your blog posts, and make sure you include photos as much as you can – images are much more likely to be shared and liked.
The other side of your content strategy is to curate and share the best possible content relating to your area of business. Don’t make the mistake of thinking the only content you should share is your own. Sharing trending articles, posts or topics is a great way of staying relevant and initiating interaction with your followers. Travelling Vineyard hit the sweet spot on Facebook here with a great mix of content.
Tips to take it to the next level
Once you’ve dipped your toes into the social media waters, you can start thinking about taking things to the next level. Creating a social media schedule is a great way of ensuring you publish content consistently. Add in upcoming events, product launches, big holidays and other things you know about in advance, while leaving space to be spontaneous and take advantage of trending topics as well. Creating and scheduling key posts in advance is a great way of making sure you still have a social media presence even if you’re away on holiday or sick.
Once you are posting and interacting regularly, you’ll want to keep track of your success. This can be done by simply keeping an eye on which of your posts are getting the most engagement, but there’s also some great social media software that can give you a more detailed picture of the success and growth of your social media presence. When you have a good idea of what your audience likes, you can tailor your posts to them in a responsive way.
One final way in which you can boost your social presence is to take advantage of social media advertising. Yes, it costs money, but running ad campaigns on platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter can be a successful way of boosting your visibility with your target audience. A short campaign can be a highly targeted way of advertising within a tight budget.
Building up your business’s social presence from scratch can take some work, but with the right approach, it can be the most rewarding (and fun!) work you do.