Social media marketing success is something that business houses are realizing as an inescapable component of their overall marketing plans. Evolving a sound social media strategy is vital if you want to succeed in your SMM (Social Media Marketing) efforts in the long term. Here are 3 keys to social media marketing success.
- There is so much hype about the need for an effective social media strategy, but you should not lose sight of the basics. Social media is all about constant engagement. Ask thought provoking questions, initiate conversations and invite others to discuss. Never focus your conversation about your product or services. Your selling efforts on social media have to be subtle and unobtrusive and not blatant. Talk passionately about matters pertaining to your industry. Furthermore, you have to post content as frequently as possible and promptly reply to queries. The speed that you attract fans and followers is based on the frequency and quality of the content you post. Make your content deliberately controversial for maximum engagement and reach.
- Make it a point to utilize visual content to the extent possible. Psychologically speaking, people are more attracted to visuals than mere prosaic text. Visual content will typically gain the highest level of engagement from your audience and make no mistake about it. Try to use tools such as Instagram that add positive value to your social media participation. These tools come at no extra cost. People are more likely to share content that is both interesting and informative as that makes them look intelligent. Add some statistics and significant facts to embellish your content.
- Always try to engage with your audience and influencers. Social media is not a one sided self-advertisement but a two-way engrossing conversation. Ferret out interesting posting and liberally comment on them. But be polite and courteous and never give the impression that you alone know. You will have to do a bit of research to ascertain what content works best – if a post gets some fabulous engagement, create more content along the same lines. Never forget to tag posts with keywords or hashtags that are relevant to your audience for attaining greater reach. Your SMM efforts are bound to succeed if you are clear in your mind about your objectives and draw a map to attain those goals.

It has always amazed me how often people forget #3…how can you do SOCIAL media without BEING social? 🙂