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Why Social Media Is A Small Business Must-Have

Is your small business really making the most of its social profiles?

Social media isn’t just great for conventional social proof or your content promotion.

It’s an audience insight tool, a community for two-way conversations, and a source of invaluable business data.

Read onto find out how your small business can benefit from social media today.

Image credit: Kaboompics.com on Pexels.com

Adding Brand Value

It’s tempting to start a small business and launch a product right away. But without a strong brand behind your business, your product won’t have much value — and that’s where Social Media can step in.

Today’s small businesses should be looking to build not only a business, but also a brand.  

A great way to begin building a brand is by implementing a Social media strategy which cascades a strong brand image across all of your social profiles.

A strong voice, unique brand personality, and strong customer relations are vital in helping transform your small business into a brand.

How to get it right

While you should absolutely use your social channels to promote your products and service, the content you share shouldn’t be entirely sales-led. Create brand value by posting content that is irreverent, humorous, or interesting, such as funny current news pieces or listicles.

Hone a brand voice that is unique and conversational without being gauche. Aim for personable and relatable, and your followers will respond.

Social Is Authentic

Social media is particularly good for building your brand in this way because it is inherently authentic. Authenticity can help sway customers when customers are researching a purchase decision.

By experiencing a genuine, true voice on social media, people build a sense of brand identity. As a result, customers are more engaged with your business — encouraging them to shop you, and in the case of existing customers, remain loyal to your brand.

When a customer makes a purchase, they are buying not only a product, but also an identity. Using social media is a great way for small businesses to show this authentic identity by way of posts and two-way communication with its audience.

How to get it right

Most social platforms offer live video, and brands can use this to display authenticity to their followers. Create live videos that give them a behind-the-scenes look into your brand, or provide live coverage of industry events.

Live video is raw, unedited, and real-life, and is as authentic as brands can get on social.

The Ultimate Social Proof

Social proof describes a psychological phenomenon where people are likely to make a decision based on positive recommendations from others. The positive testimonial of existing customers plays a huge part in a new customer’s purchase decision. Consequently, it’s a vital part of the marketer’s toolkit, and social media is the perfect platform to both source it and display it.

Social proof is especially important for small businesses looking to build a loyal customer base. Nascent brands don’t have the global footing that big names such as Pepsi have, and customer testimonials are essential for building trust in a new business, especially those operating in a very specific niche.

From solo enterprises to SMEs, social proof is the backbone of small business growth. One need only look at successful 5-figure businesses to find examples of niche brands that have built up strong customer bases with social proof sourced on social media. For example, Style On Street’s social strategy spans Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to connect with its customers and garner social proof across multiple platforms. When customers post positive testimonials on a social platform, it becomes a highly visible endorsement for a brand.

How to get it right

By inviting people to create a conversation around your brand on social, you’re eliciting social proof for your brand in a way that is natural and organic. Invite your followers to like and share a post in return for a prize draw to create an implicit endorsement of your brand (not to mention wider reach online).

Alternatively, invite your customers to submit user-generated content with a hashtag to be featured on your social feeds. UGC provides credibility to brands through authentic engagement with customers.

Create A Two-Way Conversation

A key way which small businesses can show their authenticity via social media is by engaging in two-way conversations. From basic pre-sales questions to full customer service support, small businesses can use social media to open up a direct dialogue with potential customers.

This level of personal communication can seem daunting at first, but it offers great potential to build real relationships with customers. And depending on your small business niche, some types of two-way communication may be more useful to you than others.

For example, if you are a custom sneaker maker, you could use social media to respond to individual inquiries and confirm sizing and design options.

And if you are an online gaming key reseller, you might make the most of social media by implementing an automated Facebook message response system to people who haven’t received their game downloads yet.

How to get it right

There are many opportunities to engage in conversation via social media:

  • Responding to comments on your posts
  • Accepting Direct Messages
  • Setting up automated responses e.g. to Facebook customer service messages
  • Posting content to invite conversation.

When you respond, avoid the stock phrases and clinical scripts, and instead strive to be genuine and human. If you do use a chatbot, try to make its responses as human as possible.

Insights & Analytics

Finally, social media is an important tool for all small businesses looking to make the most of customer data. It is a great way to take advantage of the reporting and analytics these platforms have built-in. Social media offers a wealth of data small businesses can use to gain insights into their markets.

If being able to measure things like ROI is important to you, then using social media and tracking links can also allow you to explore and grow this, again using the platform data and community insights.

As mentioned above, also remember to look externally to your competitors and perhaps even public groups on social media to gain further insights into your audience and market.

How to get it right

Social listening tools can provide you with a semantic insight into and analytical knowledge of how your customers are behaving and speaking about your brand online. Measure sentiment and engagement to discover how customers view your brand and use it to inform your social strategy.

While social media is very popular from a personal point of view, but it also offers a great opportunity to small businesses.

Social media is ultimately the best way to represent a brand’s authentic voice and true social proof, two key elements of any business strategy.

And alongside this, social media offers opportunities for insight and analytics not only amongst a business’s own community but also within a broader external landscape.

Victoria Greene is a content consultant and freelance writer. On her blog, VictoriaEcommerce, she shares tips on e-commerce and how companies can improve the way they represent their brand. She is passionate about using her experience to help brands improve their online reach.

The post Why Social Media Is A Small Business Must-Have appeared first on Best4Businesses.com.



This post first appeared on Small Business Blog For Entrepreneurs And Startups, please read the originial post: here

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