September 06 2017
Social media is vital to your business by helping to validate your brand, increase traffic to your website and open the lines of communication between you and your customers. So you have an Instagram account, a Facebook page, a Twitter account and a YouTube channel – but have you stopped and thought about what your intentions and motives are for these vehicles?
If you don't have a compass to guide you on the digital sphere, it might be time you create your own social media manifesto. This statement of ideals and intentions will help you foster a commitment and enable you to stay the course for why you're really on social media.
The reason for creating a social media manifesto is not just being on social media for the sake of being there. Ask yourself what is your driving force for being there? Make this your personal declaration to serve as a bold statement of principles.
The why goes before the how. If you're on social media just to be on it, then you're wasting a golden opportunity to connect, listen, educate and engage with your audience.
How will you appeal to the heart of your audience, rather than the head? Think about it this way—Apple doesn't portray themselves as technology providers; they're about innovation.
So what are you about? You're an agent by profession – but you're much more than that. You're a connector, a problem solver, a confidante, a dream maker, and a consultant. Use this as a launch pad to show your passion when developing your manifesto for social media – this is an extension of who you are. You own these channels through and through, so make sure that everything you post has a direct artery to your brand guidelines and your core values.
Execute your due diligence and create a competitive analysis on what your competitors are doing in the digital world. Look at the frequency to how often they post, what approach they take, and if they actively engaging with their audience. You can often find their strengths and weaknesses on the platform, and peel a page right out of their book – or exploit the gaps in their strategy.
A successful social media presence is all about quality, not quantity. Creating an effective, and engaging social media presence takes time and experience – but it also takes some creativity.
You can use your social media vehicles to help accomplish several business objectives, but it would be wise to narrow your focus and aim to target a few primary areas. You obviously want to build up your audience, but where do you go from there? Are you using this for sales? Customer loyalty and retention? Awareness? Or is it just a platform to show your lighter side? Define your metrics and key performance indicators in order to know what to measure.
Focus on being social – rather than just engaging in social media. This doesn't mean that you can set it and forget it because, otherwise, you might be missing out of conversations going on all around you and creative ways to interact with new audiences.
Remember, one size doesn't fit all on social media. How you would frame a piece of content on Twitter can be completely different on Instagram. You have to work with these parameters to tell your story. For example, you have to work with 140 characters or less on Twitter, whereas on Instagram you can let a high-resolution image tell your story, add text in your caption and up to 30 hashtags to expand its reach.
To view the original article, visit the IXACT Contact blog.