by Kelly Sullivan

If you are a small business owner, you’ve probably found yourself wondering if it’s necessary for you to utilize social media for your business. Whether your company is brand new, taking off, or needs a little push, there are many reasons to consider using social media to your benefit.

Maybe you’re curious about dipping your toes in the vast social media ocean. Maybe you already use it, but hate dealing with it. Either way, the answer to whether or not you need social media, or what kind to use, is not going to be the same for everyone – it just depends. 

Generally speaking, social media is a free tool that you should be taking advantage of. Your brand, your product or service, your target audience, and your customer base are all factors that you will want to consider when thinking about social media.

The people who you want to see and buy your product or service aren’t always going to be the same, but will directly impact the ways you want to market your business online. 

For example, take a company who sells portable oxygen concentrators. Their target audience and customer base are elderly clients who require oxygen tanks in their daily lives. Naturally, these won’t be their ONLY customers, but are still their main customer base.

One can imagine how creating and running an Instagram account to market the ventilators to elderly folks might be a waste of time. Their target audience probably isn’t scrolling through Instagram ever, or any other platform for that matter. A more efficient marketing tactic might be to send physical newsletters through the mail.

There will always be exceptions to social media! But, if you find that you are not one of those exceptions, here are some reasons why you should consider utilizing social media accounts to market your business.

Brand Awareness

You have to let people know that you exist. The best way to do this is online, considering over 4.62 billion people across the world use social media. On top of that, 83% of people surveyed said that they discover new products or services through Instagram.

You can use Facebook ads to advertise your product to millions of people. You can directly target a specific audience on TikTok with curated content. No matter your choice of platform, use social media to show off your brand to the world.

Client Communication

You would be shocked at how many times I searched a company’s website for contact information and wasn’t able to find any. In these instances, I always look for social media next.

Social media pages are a great way to provide your customers with reliable forms of communication. Potential customers are able to message you with questions or concerns with ease and get a speedy response. 

Email communication can be easy to lose track of, but being available on social media is one of the ways you can prove that you are reliable, consistent, and trustworthy. One thing to keep in mind, though – about half of social media users expect a response from brands on social media within three hours.

Keep the Competition Close

Immersing yourself in social media means that you are also immersing yourself in any and all content relative to your business. This is a simple yet effective way to keep an eye on the competition.

Pay attention to anything that the competition’s customers reveal online. The comment sections of product posts tell all. Any frustrations, issues, or grievances are things you can aim to better provide yourself. This is a great way to get new customers!

You can also use socials to get notified when your competitors launch new products or run promotions.

Increase Sales

Social media will become an important step in your sales funnel. Use it to turn your target audience into paying customers.

Social selling is the practice of using a brand’s social media channels to connect with prospects, develop a connection with them and engage with potential leads. This tactic can help businesses reach their sales targets. Think of social selling as modern relationship-building.

Analytics

Top social networks like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter have analytics dashboards built in. This tool helps to figure out who your target audience is, what kind of content they’re engaging with, and what they don’t care about. Google Analytics also provides you with data about your website traffic.

This is super helpful for tracking website traffic generated from social media, conversions, and email sign-ups in terms of determining your ROI (return on investment). Again, this is a FREE tool, so use it!

Influencer Partnerships

In today’s modern world, influencer marketing is not something to be ignored. The most lucrative customers come from word-of-mouth and referral marketing. Partnering with an influencer who talks up your brand to their followers will bring you the best, most loyal customers you can find. 

When you get people talking about your product or company on social media, you build brand awareness and credibility. Partnering with influencers who have a large following on social media will draw attention to your brand, which will in turn increase your sales.

Do you HAVE to have social media to be a successful business? Certainly not. But if your target audience calls for it, ignoring social media could prove to be a huge mistake for your business. Consider all the ways social media might benefit you, and find a platform that speaks to your audience. It’s free, and easy to get started.

If you want to learn more about Marketing and Sales, we have an entire online course dedicated to just that! Check out the link to our full course catalog below for more information.

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