It’s like picking up the phone and having all your friends, customers, competitors and as many other groups of people as you’d like, being on the line at the same time and having a conversation.
The beauty of social media is not only the speed of the connection, but also the reach. You don’t have to know the people in your networks, and you don’t have to pay to get in front of them (unless you choose to advertise). If you have a common interest and have something interesting to say, you can connect with the largest brand or the most important politician just as easily as you can with people you already know.
There are clear arguments for being part of the conversation on social media platforms: –
- Over 4.48 billion people use social media in 2021 and this is up from 2.07 billion in 2015
- Over 45 million of these users are based in the UK – that’s approx. 66% of the UK population
- The average user accesses 6+ different platforms every month
- Popular platforms such as Facebook and Instagram report that over 65% of their members engage with their sites at least daily
With so many platforms now available it can be difficult to know which platform to use and for what purpose. The answer is, use the platforms where your customers are and based on the above statistics, this probably means you will need to cover a few platforms to make sure that you are part of their conversation.
That doesn’t mean however that you copy and post the same content on each platform. Each has its own characteristics and just as you wouldn’t expect to see a serious news story in the Beano, people visit each platform with different expectations in mind.
We’ve developed masterclass videos and fact sheets that go into more detail around the main four sites that every business should feature on but in summary: –
- Facebook is for creating communities and building stories
- Instagram is for grabbing attention and promoting brands, products, and events
- LinkedIn is for business networking and career building
- Twitter is for hearing and creating the latest news stories
- Pinterest is for showcasing your goods
- TikTok is for showing your personality
Despite the benefits that social media provides businesses, it is estimated that one in four small businesses are still not engaging at all on social media and those that are, have limited accounts. To ensure your business maximises its potential and doesn’t lose out to your competitors, check out our guides to Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram on this site. And if you’d like additional support then contact Business Lincolnshire at https://www.businesslincolnshire.com/
marketing
How to create a social media strategy
The problem with social media for many businesses is that because we are familiar with social media in a social context or as a customer, we are not thinking about how we need to use it from a business perspective, and it’s a very different approach that we need to take.
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Facebook
Now sitting under the ‘Meta’ brand, Facebook is one of the better well known social media sites, having been around since 2004. It has around 1.51 billion users across the world. In fact it accounts for over 45 per cent of monthly social media visits.
Instagram
Part of the ‘Meta’ brand since 2012, Instagram has over a billion users and is built almost entirely around sharing images and videos. Like its sister company Facebook, Instagram started as a mainly social site, but now businesses have cottoned on to the benefits of being part of the Instagram family and it’s become a popular site for both business to business and business to consumer interactions.
LinkedIn
Launched in 2003, LinkedIn is often overlooked by businesses that sell to consumers because of its reputation as a professional networking and career development site.
Twitter
Twitter is one of the few platforms where you can follow without being a registered user. In addition to the 175 million registered users, there were an additional 120 million active users of the platform in 2019-2020 according to Statista.