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Introduction:
Many people get confused when the topic of “social media strategy” is brought up. The term “strategy” itself can seem ominous. In this post, we cover five easy fool-proof steps to create a successful social media strategy plan.
Know Your Goals
Evaluate Your Competition
Develop Your Ideal Customer Profile
Content Strategy
Set a Social Media Marketing Budget
Step One – KNOW YOUR GOALS
The first step in any content strategy is to identify your goals. You probably know your business goals and objectives (if not, then read this post). Write out those business goals (or type it) and then start to think about how you can use social media to achieve those goals. For example, you may have a goal to increase your brand awareness. Okay, that’s a great goal, and you can use social media to help you reach it.
If you want to increase brand awareness, then your social media audience needs to see you and know you. So, you’ll need more exposure. Below is a list of tactics that can increase your reach and grow your audience:
Post “behind the scenes” stories to humanize your brand Offer value-added content at least once a day Engage within 24 hrs with every comment
To summarize, make sure that you create social media goals that align with your business goals. Then create a list of three actionable ways to meet that business objective.
Need help setting your goals? Click HERE and download the social media goal setting worksheet.
Step Two – EVALUATE YOUR COMPETITION
By truly understanding your business competition, you’ll learn what will work well and where you can fill in the gaps for your industry’s customer base. Do your research and find three companies in your industry that you admire.
Next, go to their social accounts and study their content creation strategy. Look for content that has the audience engaged? Check out their audience and learn who they are. What are their gender and ages? You’ll also be able to see when they are most active, and this will help you to determine when to make posts on your social media account. Whatever you notice that they are doing well, implement that on your account.
Now that you know your competition, it’s time to figure out what they’re not doing in their social media content! This is your ticket to bring uniqueness to the industry and score some new fans! Perhaps they don’t use videos to showcase their product or service? So, you can try using videos to draw attention. You could develop an offer that is specific to your company and gain an edge over your competitors.
Step Three – DEVELOP YOUR IDEAL CUSTOMER PROFILE
This is often an overlooked step, but it is one of the most critical aspects of a successful social media content strategy. You must identify and create an ideal client profile.
When you create an ideal client profile, you begin to really understand what your client is struggling with and what transformation they are wanting to achieve. It makes it easy to put into words how your service can take them from their point of struggle and provide the desired outcome.
This understanding will help you write content that will help draw your target audience in and make them feel like you are speaking directly to them.
Just a note, you may have more than one ideal client profile. This is especially true if you offer a range of business services.
Step Four – CONTENT STRATEGY
Now that you have established your goals and put metrics in place, scoped out the competition, and created an ideal client profile, it’s time to start creating content.
When you’re creating content for social media, be sure to include content that will help establish a relationship with your audience, provide value, promote your product and service, entertain and inspire.
If you’re struggling with what kind of content to post, put out a poll and do a little market research on your audience. You can also look back at past posts and find one that has done well and post on that subject again. If you still need ideas, then head over to a competitors page and see what content has done well for them.
Creating a social media content calendar can reduce the amount of time and stress it takes to create content. You can use a printed or an online calendar (like google calendar) to collect your content ideas.
Always include eye-catching graphics. There are several useful apps that will help you create professional and beautiful graphics to include.
Canva Adobe Spark Easil
The key is to post content to establish trust with your audience consistently. Take time to plan out your marketing content and think about when you’ll post.
A general rule of thumb for each platform is:
Facebook 1-2x/day Instagram 3-5x/week but SHOW UP ON STORIES DAILY!!!!! Pinterest 15-20 pins/day Twitter 15x/day
If those numbers are overwhelming, don’t panic! There are a ton of great content scheduling tools available to help you get your content in front of your audience.
Facebook offers a great publishing tool right in the Facebook app. Also, you can post to Instagram through Facebook Creator. For Instagram, try Planoloy. Tailwind is king when it comes to Pinterest and look into Tweetdeck for Twitter.
Step Five – SET A SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING BUDGET
Setting a budget is essential and often overlooked. You need to know how much you’re spending on social media so that you can, accurately, calculate your ROI.
Do you have a product that you are launching and want to promote? Using social media ads is a great way to promote your launch, but decide beforehand how much you are willing to spend. Take into account any monthly costs for scheduling tools, editing software, or outsourcing that you may incur and track it.
With your marketing budget plan in place, you’ll be able to plan for marketing expenses. At the end month, compare your financials to your budget and make any adjustments that may be necessary.
Putting a social media strategy in place is well worth the time and effort. Social media is a powerful tool for your business, and following these steps can dramatically improve your success.
Looking for help creating a successful social media marketing strategy for your business? Learn more about our Posting with Purpose VIP Strategy sessions here.
Conclusion:
In this post, we discussed five easy steps for a successful social media marketing strategy. This will help you to have a better understanding of your business goals and social media marketing plan.
Know Your Goals
Evaluate Your Competition
Develop Your Ideal Customer Profile
Content Strategy
Set a Social Media Marketing Budget
