The Importance Of A Social Media Plan
Social media marketing can help you build a dedicated audience where it spends its time generating multiple sources of traffic, attracting customers and expanding your business through the power of online networks. Your social media marketing plan should be planned for all relevant social networks, not just Facebook and Instagram, but you need to look and make sure you can find your target audience on the other social networks.
A social media strategy should be part of your overall marketing strategy to bring you closer to achieving your business goals. You need to identify your target audience and key brand message and set goals for generating valuable content, consistent posts and communicating with your target audience on social media. It’s also important to set up social media publishing plan or content calendar to help you share certain content in the best possible way, taking into account social media standards for sharing the same content.
Your company's goals are important, but you also need to find the right tone, the right subjects, and the right conversations to ensure that the content delivers the experience your audience wants. Remember the content and experience that the audience expects determines whether you achieve the business results from your efforts.
When you create your brand, be it a product or service based on your own name, you determine not only what your audience wants, but also what topics and content they will value, such as your business updates, new product launch, look behind the scenes, meet the team etc. If you've done your homework right, your content marketing will focus on the issues that matter to your audience.
Before you start, it is important to draw up a plan and get down to work. With an understanding of your goals, your target audience and how to use different channels you can then create the framework you need to manage and plan your social media content calendar.
Whether you want to expand your online presence or post regularly to keep your fans up-to-date, your brand should always come first. Smart, detailed goals allow you to build a well-structured campaign, measure your progress and optimise your social media strategy over the long term. You need to set goals for your posting, engagement and frequency to make yourself or your team responsible for following your plan.
It’s also important you know who your competitors are and what they’re doing on social media so it’s important to do a competitor analysis. Select 5-10 competitors and search for them on the main social networks: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, Google My Business and TikTok and any other place online you think they’ll be. Researching the major networks to learn more about your competitors will help you understand you target audience more which in turn will allow you to spend time focusing your efforts on building, nurturing and maintaining a community online. The goal is to select each social network so that you can target your audience on the channels you know they hang out on whilst maintaining your brand image.
You might also want to consider using influencers as part of your social media plan. These are people online who like and use your products and services and who are able to promote your brand on social media authentically to their followers. It’s not always about using the top influencers in your niche knowing they will have a large audience it’s more about using people you know are authentic and who a solid reputation and that you know have the added benefit of knowing all your products.
Once you have your social media marketing plan and have planned your posts on your content calendar and how it fits in with your overall marketing strategy you can then update member of your team to make sure you can all work together to help your business to make the most of your social media strategy and online accounts.
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