Yes, your best competitors are making their business better and better all the while. And their growth is all about their social marketing strategy. Of course, if you pay attention to competitors, you know this. What would you do to your Facebook business page if you were trying to improve your social marketing?
The competitor to be feared is one who never bothers about you at all but goes on making his own business better all the time.
Henry Ford
Check out our thoughts on team leverage.
Social media has come a long way since then as have the strategies, tactics, methods, and power associated with social media.
In reality, a successful social media marketing campaign is multi-dimensional. It’s complicated. Ask any social media marketer “How do you do social media marketing?” and you’re likely to get the “Um, where do I start?” look.
There are a lot of elements to address and minute details to cover. Often, the most difficult stage is the initial one, when you’re trying to gain traction and pick up momentum.
Lots of advertisers wonder if Facebook advertising works. Take a look at these numbers: 85% of new WordStream users are already advertising on Facebook;
Facebook ads get 22 billion clicks a year, and those ads reach a total of 1.6 billion active monthly users. It’s clear Facebook is an attractive channel for advertisers — that many users can’t be wrong.
Related post: Social Media Plan … Successful Tactics You Need to Employ
Have you noticed? It is hard not to see, isn’t it? Let’s examine the ten ways Facebook would recommend improving your social marketing strategy:
Facebook business page … tagline and Brand
The heart of any businesses’ marketing strategy is their brand. The brand is built into and reflected by its tagline … spend enough time to find a good one. As an example, we like the one used by the Morgan and Morgan law practice: For the People. Or, the longer version, representing the People, not the Powerful.
They clearly understand that their brand is not about them. Rather it is about how the potential client community sees them, feels about them, and talks about them. They realize that their brand represents their current and future relationships. Their goal is to deliver an emotional connection to their services. And they are doing it very well. Got the idea?
Media commercials
You should use both TV and radio ads building and reinforce the brand. Educating the public on important issues that are important to them. Doing almost no selling. Make them a short 15 seconds with one simple message. Make as many as possible and use them all. You don’t want to swamp potential customers with repeats. Create a very personal image in these commercials and use them on your social media channels.
Facebook business account… website
Google would tell you to make the site the physical center of your firm’s marketing. Make the design simple but as elegant and eye-catching as you can. Give it the means to contain all the strategy elements discussed today. Encompasses several ways to allow two-way client engagements, including live chat, email, and telephone.
Again little to no selling. Your strategy should reflect the belief that pushy sales pitches turn customers off, but personally relevant and interactive engagement switches them on. Make customers notice that all the material is put into their language.
Facebook business page tips … embrace public issues
Keep several public concerns front and center in your marketing strategy at any one time. Let your senior leadership take their messages on the issues of potential clients via community speaking engagements as well as all the marketing channels at their disposal. All of the items on the agenda represent those that the public majority supports.
Advocacy advertising
Most of the issues that you decide to support should be used in the commercials as advocacy advertisements. These create very strong brand reinforcement.
Facebook business page tips … content marketing
Put content marketing to very practical use on your blog and other social media platforms, starting with your Facebook page. They typically recommend at least have 8-10 blogs on various topics per month to help educate potential clients.
The blogs should be archived by multiple categories and by month and year. With proper search engine optimization on each blog, the blogs do an excellent job of driving new potential customers to the website.
Adapting to change
Facebook recommends being very progressive, keeping up to speed on customer trends, problem areas, and social media technology. Certainly, always be eager to adapt your business marketing expertise to new areas. And certainly always look to try new things throughout their company marketing, with a particular focus on social media.
Social media
Facebook believes businesses should start with the Facebook platform and then add 3-5 more (Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, and YouTube) over time to increase your customer engagement. All channels should be utilized to share all their material in a conversational manner. Always looking to engage.
Short and sweet messages
80-90% of the marketing messages should be 15 seconds. Very simple and to the point or objective. As we said previously, many topics are used to produce many notes so as not to over saturate the market with the same messages.
More learning: 6 KLM Airlines Marketing Examples for Winning Campaigns
Integrating the elements
All 10 of these strategy elements complement the firm’s brand and messages. The integrating elements? The brand and the client educational element. The key is to have a central theme to the brand. This is the most important part of the strategy.
The bottom line
The next big thing always starts out looking like nothing at all. If it was easy to see coming, everybody would be doing it already and the market impact would be minimal. So you can never create something truly new based on what you already know. The only way to find it is to start looking.
Not all who wander are lost. The trick is to wander with a purpose.
Here’s the thing, social isn’t just a new way of marketing, it’s a new way of running a business. Facebook certainly has figured this out and are using social marketing to rapidly grow many of their client’s business.
Need some help in capturing more customers from your social media marketing or advertising? Creative ideas to help the differentiation with your customers?
Call today for a FREE consultation or a FREE quote. Learn about some options to scope your job.
Call Mike at 607-725-8240.
All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that fight gets better every day you learn and apply new ideas.
When things are not what you want them to be, what’s most important is your next step. Call today.
Test. Learn. Improve. Repeat.
Are you devoting enough energy innovating your social media strategy?
Do you have a lesson about making your advertising better you can share with this community? Have any questions or comments to add in the section below?
Mike Schoultz is the founder of Digital Spark Marketing, a digital marketing and customer service agency. With 40 years of business experience, he blogs on topics that relate to improving the performance of your business. Find them on G+, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change. We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way. Call us for a free quote today. You will be amazed at how reasonable we will be.
More reading on social media design from Digital Spark Marketing’s Library:
Creative Tips for Stunning Infographic Design
Social Media Graphics …9 Great Ways to Improve Your Marketing Designs
Facebook Design … 8 Secret Factors for Most Successful Marketing
Creative Stories … Are You Employing the Best Smashing Value?
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