In the industrial revolution when people would all be working together to create products, social media didn’t exist. The businesses worked efficiently and as time went on people were then replaced by machinery who could create products faster and this saved the businesses lots of money long term.
In those days we got on well without social media but as we have evolved into the digital age, social media has become a part of our everyday lives. Not using social media could be the determining factor of your success as it will be very hard to stand out and do well.
According to various internet sources, the first recognisable social media site were created in 1997. Social media is popular because it allows people to chat with their friends and family worldwide over the internet sharing messages, photos, videos and more.
To fully utilise social media and be successful you must have content. This content could be in the form of photographs, articles and videos. To gain your client’s attention, you will need to post often, and consistently. This will also help the software algorithms to recognise you and get you and your business seen in the competitive market.
Pick a day that you would like to post on all your social media platforms and stick to it. People don’t subscribe to a YouTube channel directly because of the content available but because of the content that will be available in the future. They subscribe to make sure that when a new video goes online, they get to see it. They want to keep up to date with you, and the best way to do this is by being consistent with the day that you choose.
Social media checklist for beginners
If you are not yet active on social media here is a checklist that you should start working towards immediately.
- Register with all social media sites to secure your name (Facebook, instagram, twitter, YouTube, reddit, Pinterest and more.)
- Create logo and add it to all platforms
- Create cover photo for Facebook showing what your business does.
- Start planning posts for all platforms, if you are a food based company you should be posting content about food, recipes, events, inspiration, and updates with your business.
- Your about us information should be filled out showcasing your story swell as how and why your business was started.
- Film a video introducing you, showcase what you do and what you want to achieve.
Leading social media platforms and how to use them
1. Facebook
With 2.9 billion active users on facebook, you do not want to miss out on some potential reach. Even though the Facebook algorithm is not as good as it used to be and there will be limited reach unless you pay to boost your posts, there is a huge potential to reach a large audience if you use the platform right.
To use Facebook to its full potential, you should create a page for your business, upload posts and videos regularly. Posts with links get less reach unless you boost them as the social media giant wants to keep people on their website. Post consistently a few times per week or everyday if you can. Create content that will encourage people to share. Using all of these platforms will be a learning curve and so if you do not have the time or skill to use them well, I would highly recommend outsourcing to a social media expert.
2. Instagram
Owned by Facebook, Instagram is one of the biggest photo sharing social media platforms ever created. The algorithm is similar to Facebook, only the platform boosts those accounts that you use the right hashtags, use all the features including creating posts, short video reels and adding photos or videos to the story function. Researching hashtags will give you more chance of success, you can add a link to your bio to encourage clicks to your YouTube channel or website and here is our Free Instagram cheat sheet that if you follow you will notice a huge increase in engagement.
- 12.6% more engagement when your post includes a hashtag.
- 36% more engagement with photos compared to videos
- 38% more likes when your picture includes a person or face
- 56% more engagement when you include another users handle in your post
- 79% more engagement when you include a location in your post
BONUS TIPS: Talk to followers, reply to comments, never spam, always write captions and use one or two hashtags.
3. Twitter
Twitter has over 395 million active users, however,I have applied the same techniques that I have used on other social media platforms but I have not got on well with Twitter and so I don't think I can provide you with any value here. I have tried many tactics without much luck but have seen many businesses do well on Twitter.
4. YouTube
The largest video streaming social media needs no introduction, it is owned by Google and will give your company a huge boost if you use it well. With 2.1 Billion monthly users, you can create weekly videos about your products, a service you offer and grow an audience.
To use it well, you will want to:
- Post at least one video per week
- Make videos between 6-12 minutes
- Learn SEO to write better titles, tags, keywords, and video descriptions.
- Embed videos onto your website
- Research video topics before making them
- Plan your videos
- Use your analytics to spot trends and figure out what videos to make next.
There are so many more tips that I could give you but wouldn't be able to cover them all in one article.
5. Pinterest
This social media platform has 433 million monthly users and is a lot easier to get reach in comparison to Facebook. The way I use it and have accumulated 130+ clicks every month in just three days of work is like this. You convert your featured images from your blogs posts to the correct size for Pinterest which is: 1500 x 1000 pixels then you upload them on the platform as a pin with a link to the blog post. You have to fill in information such as title, description, alt text and url but doing this for every article and video you make will give you a huge boost.
These pins can be organised into different boards where people can save them which is kind of like sharing to more places. The best thing about Pinterest is that the work you do now will continue to be seen for years whereas other social media platforms such as Facebook have a much shorter life.
There are plenty more social media platforms up and coming and some of them may be worth using, a few more that I like is mobile video platform TikTok, questions and answers based social media called Quora, and forum based social media called Reddit which are worth checking out.
Do you need a website for business?
If you don't have a website you should create one, it will be your business hub and will include: about your business, a shop, it could have an affiliates programme, a welcome offer, terms and conditions, wholesale, FAQ, Gift card, and more.
The benefits of social media for your business
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Popularity and revenue
Social media could help you or your business to become more popular, this would result in more traffic to your website which translates to more revenue in one way or another. The more traffic you get to your monetised website the more chance you have in gaining a customer or making money.
No matter your business type, this concept is nearly always the same. Your monetisation methods could include – adverts, product placement, affiliates, services, selling physical products (items), selling digital products (songs, albums, games, software, etc.)
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Customers and updates
Many people like to share the experiences that they have had with your company online. This could help you to gain more customers, as they would be sharing the post with their friends who will then be introduced to you. With the ability of them being able to like your pages, they will be kept up to date every time you post something new.
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Ranking
In the world of websites, there are many ranking factors related closely to googles search results and one of them is backlinks. There are two types of backlinks, these are do-follow and not-follow. Whilst do-follow links to your website from others is better for ranking, not-follow links from social media and social shares are still beneficial for ranking as it improves your website’s popularity.
Up next: How to start your own business?
