Ways to Create a Social Media Marketing Plan

Posted in Marketing | 17 comments

Without a doubt, social media plays an important role in business and marketing. Most business owners realize that it is an effective and powerful tool in marketing campaigns. It is a key for creating customer engagement, building online brand awareness and developing audience growth.

However, some business owners are having difficulty trying to figure out where to start or what to include. This is the reason why it is important to create a strategic social media marketing roadmap and plan.

Having a social media plan is just as important as having a solid business plan. Social media marketing requires commitment and a measurable plan for you to reach your business goals.

Here are ways to get it done.

1. Set your goals

What should your business aim to achieve?

Identify if your target is to promote your products and services, gain brand exposure, penetrate a new market group or engage with your customers. Or is it to provide customer service?

2. Know your customer

Who are you trying to reach?

Your social media marketing plan won’t be successful if you have no idea who you are trying to reach. When you set a clear picture of who your target customers are, you can match your social media marketing efforts with where they are spending their time.

In this process, you identify:

• your best customers
• how they interact with information
• the issues they are most concerned with
• where they network online

3. Choose the best social site to use

What is the best social site for your small businesses?

With dozens of social networks, it is essential to use the one which is most appropriate for your business marketing plan. You can start with having a presence on just one social network, then experiment with the others afterwards.

To help you, here are the current leading social sites:

• Facebook: The best tool for engaging with customers and building community.
• Twitter: The best tool for interacting in real-time.
• Google Plus+: Platform for greater brand visibility and to boost your site’s search engine optimization (SEO)
• Pinterest: A platform for sharing viral photos.
• LinkedIn: A great tool for B2B social networking to reach influencers within your industry
• YouTube:  Is owned by Google and also helps engage people and will also boost your SEO.

4. Define your tone and frequency

What approach will you use for your posts and how often?

Choose a tone depending on the information that you’ll be posting. You can use casual language to keep your fans engaged. Avoid those hard sales pitches which most customers don’t appreciate.

To reach all your followers, create about 3 to 5 posts throughout the day. It will keep your social site updated and fresh.

5. Prepare the type of content to post

Your post depends on your audience and social-media platform. If you have to share promotional posts, use images and videos instead of text.

To keep your social site engaging, you can use diverse mix of content such as photos, short videos, helpful tips, questions, useful links and information, etc. Aim for balance and variety.

When using Twitter, you can also retweet posts of your fans, business partners and industry influencers. Of course, you can use Pinterest and Instagram specifically for your product images, company events, and other interesting snapshots.

6. Measure your success

What metrics can you use to measure the success of your social media marketing efforts?

You need to continually track your social media metrics to see which content works and which does not.

You can use Google Analytics, Page Insights, Row Feeder, Hootsuite, Spout Social, and TweetReach to help you analyze your social media efforts.

Facebook has Page Insights to let you know the number of people interacting with your posts. You can use Google Analytics to gauge the effectiveness of your social media campaigns at driving traffic to your online store, blog or website.

Doing this will help you plan for future posts and decide the best way to connect with your customers.

Are you looking for ways to use social media in your marketing campaigns effectively? Let Pamela  Finnesand, The Business Maximizer, assist you. Watch our business-altering video titled “The 3 Biggest Lead Generation Mistakes Small Businesses Make… And How To Overcome Them All.” We’ll reveal the strategies you can immediately deploy that will enable you to out-think, out-market and out-sell your competition. http://maximizeracademy.com/