Does social media form part of your marketing activity?
Social media is ideal for reaching and engaging with prospective customers cost effectively, but many B2B’s use it sporadically, or delegate ownership to the office junior who ‘gets’ it. These approaches often result in a lack of strategy, consistency and hit or miss results.
Dan Ince of BrandWorks Social shares his approach to develop an effective, results-focused social media strategy for B2B’s.
Define your objectives
For any marketing activity to be effective, you need to start with identifying your objectives. With clarity of what you’re trying to achieve, you can define what success looks like and develop a strategy to deliver it.
Want to get your business in front of more of your ideal customers?
Want to help them understand who you are, what you do, and how you can help them?
Want them to get in touch with you?
Social media can help achieve these objectives, and in a highly targeted way as over 66% of people in the UK are active on social platforms.
Understand your audience
Who are your current customers? What needs & traits do they have? Why do they choose to work with you, rather than a multitude of competitors?
Taking the time to understand your existing customers and identify your target customers is worth it. It allows you to build up a picture of exactly who they are, their needs, interests and the problems your business solves for them.
Identify the right platforms
Which social media platforms should your business be using?
Simple. The ones where your customers and prospective customers are most active and receptive to your message.
93% of B2B marketers use LinkedIn to reach and engage prospective customers. With over 10m UK users active on the platform every week, LinkedIn is an extremely efficient way of reaching your target customers and educating them about what you have to offer.
Remember it’s important not to put all your social media eggs in one basket though. Many of our clients are also active on Instagram and Facebook for greater reach.
Plan & publish good content
While you want to use social media to showcase your business, it’s important to remember that no one likes to be ‘sold’ to.
To create an engaging content plan, put yourself in your customers’ shoes and identify 3-5 themes that can become your content pillars. Then develop content that educates, inspires and entertains your audience.
Developing a visual look and tone of voice for your social activity that mirrors your existing marketing materials will help your content stand out and leave a positive, consistent impression.
Overall, ensure your content plan is engaging and balanced with a clear call to action where appropriate, and plan your content to go out consistently (typically every other day) to build your presence.
Take time to engage
To get results from social, it’s vital to not only share great content, but also engage with your audience.
Respond to comments on your content, like and engage with other people’s content, take time to get to know people and build relationships. It’s called ‘social’ media for a reason!
Review performance
It’s easy to ignore performance metrics, place far too much store in followers and likes, or swamp yourself in data when it comes to assessing performance.
Identify the metrics that matter to you - the ones that demonstrate whether your social activity is delivering your business objectives.
As a guide, most of our clients want to build reach and engagement - with the right people. These measures help us understand whether we’re reaching and growing their audience, as well as identifying the type of content their audience are most interested in.
We recommend reviewing performance monthly to identify actions you can take to further improve performance.
Keep up to date
Social media platforms are constantly evolving and adding new features. It’s important to keep up to date with changes on the platforms you’re using and understand whether there are any implications for your strategy.
One easy way to do this is to follow people who regularly publish platform updates such as Andy Lambert, John Espirian and Matt Navara.
Make sure you have the right resources
Developing your social media strategy, producing regular content, and assessing performance regularly to optimise your approach requires a level of expertise and can be time-consuming.
If you’d like the weight of social media management lifted off your shoulders, consider outsourcing it to a specialist agency who can develop a bespoke plan focused on delivering results to achieve your objectives.
For more support follow me on LinkedIn or visit brandworkssocial.co.uk