Customers are looking for more than just products and services from a business — they are looking for meaningful connections. Now more than ever, our lives are driven through digital connections, which has brought about an amplification of social media tools to build bridges between brands and their audience. Social media marketing is a digital transformation that is in full swing. With an effective strategy, businesses can use social media marketing to open doors and connect directly with their audience in fresh and innovative ways.

With more than an estimated 4 billion active social media users worldwide, social media platforms provide a massive audience for businesses to build a greater online presence. By not taking advantage of social platforms within your marketing strategy, you’re missing out on an inexpensive, quick, and effective way to reach almost half of the world’s population in just a few clicks.

Whether it be a large corporation or a small “ma’-and-pop” business, social media marketing for business is no longer an option. It has become vital to gain valuable insights, connect with new and existing customers, increase brand awareness, and generate more leads.

Today, social media marketing is no longer limited to the digital marketing mavens of the world. Business owners and anyone with access to a social media platform can learn how to leverage social media to grow your business. 

What is Social Media Marketing?

DigitalMarketing.org defines the term Social Media Marketing as “the process of creating tailored content for each social media platform to drive engagement and promote your business.” Social media marketing is all about creating a space to connect with customers and help them better understand your brand. A solid social media marketing strategy has a blended balance of tailored content on each social media profile, engaging and listening to your followers, analyzing results, and running social media advertisements. A few major social media platforms (at the moment) are Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, and TikTok.

Establish Credibility and Expand Your Audience

Social Media is a place for discovery, and now, it’s nearly as common for consumers to learn about a brand or company on social media as TV or radio ads. Today’s consumers research a specific product or brand before making a purchase, and a brand’s social media presence is significant in the consumer buying process. Successful businesses will focus on platforms where their target audience is active. For example, 70% of consumers look to Instagram for their next purchase. 

Authenticity and trust are essential to consumers, and being active on social media assures them your business is real and not a scam. Potential customers use social media profiles to gauge how your business interacts with customers.

Creating and sharing authentic and genuine content is a great way to establish credibility and expand your audience. When left with a relatable story, consumers are more likely to remember it, leading them to seek out your business for future needs. 

Gain Marketplace Insights

A valuable advantage of social media is marketplace insights. What better way to know the thoughts and needs and receive feedback from consumers than directly communicating to them? With social media platforms creating tools to ask questions through stories like poll taking, voting, and open-ended questions, active feedback can assist your business with customer service and discover which products are more profitable than others.

Interacting with customers who share negative feedback is just as important as good feedback. Staying on top of such comments will tremendously benefit your business. Mistakes will happen, they are inevitable, but the sooner you address and fix an issue, the more customers are likely to return due to your active approach. Address the problem, take accountability, and compensate the customer to make up for the negative or troubling experiences. By strengthening customer trust in your business, potential customers will see an authentic and trustworthy company that they can trust.

Increase Inbound Traffic and Inbound Marketing Potential

In recent years, especially with social media, inbound marketing has become a strategy that small and large businesses are looking to implement quickly. According to Hubspot, “Inbound marketing is a business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experience tailored to them; inbound marketing forms connections with your audience and solves problems they already have.”  

Every social media platform you create for your business is a doorway to your website. Each piece of curated content you post is another opportunity to obtain a new customer. The lack of strategic social media marketing limits inbound traffic to your usual customers. Utilizing social media as a part of your marketing strategy will alleviate the difficulty of reaching new customers outside your loyal customer base. Social media is a melting pot of different types of people with diverse backgrounds. With a more targeted and informed approach, you’re able to attract customers likely to be interested in your product or service, which in return will help them organically reach your business.

Get Started Today!

It’s clear that social media marketing has its advantages, and as you can see, your business can no longer afford not to use social media. Businesses today cannot afford to miss out on an inexpensive, fast, and effective way to reach a wider audience. Laing Media has worked with companies of all sizes to create