Any business can benefit from social media, regardless if they’re big or small, online, or offline. Social media gives access to tons of information that would allow any business to increase their consumer base, lower their cost of marketing, and offer their products and services more effectively.
The power of social media and its ability to make or break businesses can’t be underestimated. If you’re looking to grow your business effectively, efficiently, and without going over budget, social media is your best bet. This is especially true for Philadelphia based businesses, both large and small.
Here are five ways that social media can be used to grow your business.
Generate Content To Increase Customer Base
As the most effective way to increase your customer base, social media should be included in any business’ marketing strategy. Generating content relevant to your brand and your target audience boosts your visibility among potential customers without having to exert a lot of time and effort. Social media marketing is also incredibly low-cost since creating a profile on all of the major platforms is free. A perfect example of this can be seen through getting new followers and advocates who might share your best content and information with others online.
Facebook, Instagram, and other social media sites have enhanced a business’ ability to advertise to their audience. For instance, the target reach of a particular advertisement or campaign can be narrowed down to include your customers’ social media activity, their recent search history, and more. With this, even businesses with niche products and services don’t have to spend a lot of money to reach their target consumers.
Boost Search Engine Ranking
Any business will benefit from landing on the first page of Google’s search engine results. Achieving this will mean that your website or your social media platforms will be the first thing that potential customers see, which increases your leads and website traffic, and enhances your brand image among clients and competitors alike. Additionally, becoming a top-ranked search engine result reduces your marketing cost; the better your ranking is, the less you have to spend on generating leads and attracting customers.
One of the best ways to optimize your business’ search engine ranking is through your social media content. Publishing high-quality and shareable content regularly, as well as ensuring that anything you post has relevant keywords are all things that businesses can do to land on top of search engine results.
Increase Traffic To Business Website
Businesses who don’t have a strong presence on social media find that they have little to no organic traffic, generated only from the small number of people that are already aware of them. Without social media, businesses have to rely on word-of-mouth marketing, which is incredibly fickle and is oftentimes ineffective. Or they make use of traditional marketing methods, such as print ads and TV commercials, which cost a lot and are only useful for select products and services.
If you’re looking to grow your business through social media, make sure that you leverage the purposes of each platform by publishing or sharing customized content on each. For instance, Twitter is great for posting bite-sized information and interacting with your customers while bold graphics and eye-catching images are a must on Instagram. You can even make use of LinkedIn to expand your professional network.
Check Out Your Competitors
Aside from increasing brand visibility among potential customers, social media is also useful for checking out the competition. Successfully growing a business means being aware of who your competitors are and what they’re doing, and you can use social media to do just that. Through their platforms, you can gauge what services or products they offer and how satisfied their current customers are. With this information, you can evaluate how your own business is doing and whether or not there are areas that you’re lacking in.
However, it’s important to learn not only from the success of your competitors but from their failures, as well. What factors led to their marketing strategy failing? Where did they go wrong? What could they have done to minimize the impact? These questions – and more – can be answered by taking a look at their social media platforms and what netizens are saying about them. This will be able to help you formulate crisis strategies, back-up plans, and contingencies for your business.
In summary
There are many companies out there who have managed to disrupt entire industries simply by taking advantage of social media platforms. Social media has proven to be one of the best tools that a business can have in their arsenal.