social media marketing Archives

Keeping Up with the Times: Boost Your Brand’s Popularity on TikTok to Boost Your Business

Things move pretty fast in the world of social media, and internet marketing. Blink, and you might miss something! The landscape of social media is changing all the time, and businesses need to keep up with the times. So is your business keeping up with the times? You might already have a strong presence on Facebook, Twitter, and maybe even Instagram, but how confident are you about using one of the newest, youngest, and most popular platforms: TikTok? If you’re feeling a little unsure how to best use this platform for your business, we’ve got some essential strategies for boosting your popularity on TikTok, and boosting your business in the process.

TikTok: The Basics

tiktok app on a phone — *TikTok is not just for dancing, it can help boost your business and brand.*

While TikTok started as a fun video streaming app mostly aimed at Gen Zers, it has now taken the marketing and advertising world by storm, completely changing the way brands create and share content. It’s a video-based app, but unlike on YouTube, the videos have a time limit of ten minutes (recently upped in the past few months from only three minutes). TikTok has over 1 billion active users, so if you get it right, you can reach a huge amount of potential customers.

So what is TikTok all about? Some people might think it’s all dances, challenges, and pranks, and while that’s a lot of the content on this platform, it’s not all there is, and there’s definitely potential for creating interesting stuff. What’s most important to remember about TikTok is that it’s all about fun and visually appealing content, meaning this isn’t the place for serious, sit-down sales pitches!

No, this platform is a place to entertain and connect with potential customers on a personal level – and those potential customers will often be, shall we say, on the younger side. In fact, almost 50% of US TikTok users are below the age of 30, and over half of those users are teenagers. For brands targeting younger audiences, TikTok can be the best thing that ever happened to them. But remember, even if your business is not completely focused on Gen Z, you can still benefit from marketing on TikTok. More than half of the users are over 30; not only that, but it’s always a good idea to be somewhere that’s influential with the younger generation: they could grow up to be your target audience, after all!

So what are some of the basic ways you can get a presence on TikTok? Start by:

Creating lighthearted videos set to music, perhaps demo-ing your product. TikTok videos don’t need to be highly polished. In fact, you can just take out your phone and start filming! But they do need to feel authentic. It’s better to make a simple video that highlights your brand than to try to create a wacky one in an attempt to go viral – you can’t predict what will go viral and you could just end up looking inauthentic.
Launching a hashtag challenge encouraging TikTok users to create or recreate content and add your branded hashtag to it.
Working with TikTok influencers. Influencers on this platform might not be as big as on other platforms yet, but they can still help you avoid looking like you’re making traditional ads, which Gen Z and other TikTok users tend to avoid like the plague.

Why Use TikTok for Marketing?

The above are the basics of using TikTok – not so different from other social media platforms, right? So there’s nothing to be intimidated about! You just need to remember to keep things fun, authentic, and short when using TikTok. But before we get to some more technical details, we want to briefly go over why you should be making the effort in the first place.

So why use TikTok for marketing? Because it allows you to: graph moving upward with a green arrow

Increase your brand’s awareness – With all of the creative videos you make and the hashtag challenges you invite people to join, you can really highlight what you’re all about, and boost your brand.
Promote your products/services in an authentic-feeling way – We’ve moved a long way past traditional marketing these days, and most people can sniff out a sales push a million miles away, so finding ways to connect with people while promoting your products in a non-pushy way is essential.
Enlarge your audience – As we already pointed out, TikTok has a billion active users – and these users are spread out over 140+ countries, meaning you have the potential to gain an international following.
Reach new customers – You’ll be building your customer base by connecting authentically with people, and probably getting your brand noticed by people who don’t engage on other social media platforms, or who rarely see traditional advertising.

Making the Most of TikTok

That all sounds pretty good, right? And like we said, using TikTok is not much harder than creating content for other social media platforms – you just need some creativity. With that being said, though, there are some specific things you should be doing so you can boost your brand’s popularity on TikTok as much as possible. For example:

Know how “For You” pages work

What’s the holy grail for businesses when it comes to any social media platform? Having their content recommended to users! And it’s no different on TikTok: your goal should be to appear on TikTok’s “For You” page. The TikTok For You page is basically a personalized, scrollable feed of content, serving as the app’s home screen – meaning it’s the first thing users see when they open the app. It’s known for its fine-tuned algorithm that produces accurate recommendations based on each user’s actions on TikTok (e.g., what they like, share, view more than once, etc.). But with that being said, TikTok is also pretty secretive about its algorithm, so you’re going to have to work at getting on these pages, especially since not appearing on any For You pages means your chances of getting noticed are pretty slim.

Basically, what happens is that whenever somebody creates and uploads a video, TikTok pushes it to a batch of viewers, and the TikTok algorithm will evaluate its “Performance Ranking” The “Performance Ranking” is based on the video’s Completion Ratio (i.e., the percentage of the video the initial viewers watch), shares, comments, and likes. If the resulting “Performance Ratio” is high enough, TikTok will continue to push the video to another group of viewers. The Completion Ratio is the most critical part of the equation, so you need to ensure that your video is good enough that people watch it until the end, and that they engage with it.

The good news is that their algorithm doesn’t take into account follower count or a history of high-performing content, so you don’t have to be an established TikTok star to make a dent. Not only that, but unlike on other social media platforms, the For You page encourages users to try out content from strangers before showing them videos their friends might have uploaded since they last opened the app.

So, as with most social media content creation, it essentially all comes down to creating high-quality content, and using the platform’s content publishing features in an effective way (see below). But if you do want a bit of a leg up, there is one cheat you can use: if you pay for your business to have a Pro account on TikTok, you will be able to access trends and analytics for the application, and will be able to see insights into who is watching your videos and sharing them. Since there is not much insight into TikTok’s algorithm, this information can come in pretty handy.

Be up on TikTok’s content publishing features

There are ways you can leverage the platform’s content publishing tools to make sure your videos get the attention they deserve, and hopefully get you into as many For You pages as possible. For example, you can: a hashtag with the word hashtag next to it

Write a short description – You’ve only got 150 characters, so make it good!
Include hashtags – Be sure to keep on top of what is trending, and make sure you’re targeting them to your specific audience.
Use trending sounds – Yes, sounds are a ranking signal for the TikTok algorithm. So, using trending audio clips can increase your chances of surfacing on more For You pages.

Tag friends – Tags are especially useful if you’re collaborating with another brand, an influencer, or a content creator.
Add links – If you have a TikTok Business account, you can add a link in your bio by editing your profile and adding a URL to the Website field. In your videos, you can then ask users to sign up, browse products, or make a purchase via the link in your bio.
Enable duet/stitch – By enabling this feature, you can allow users to use your videos to create duets or stitch your videos with their own to create unique or response content.

Use TikTok ads

TikTok avoided having advertising on it for a while, but now there are multiple possibilities for your business to advertise on TikTok:

Infeed Native Content: Similar to Snapchat or Instagram story ads, and supports features like website clicks and app downloads. These ads are limited to 60 seconds, so you’ve got to keep them tight!
Brand Takeovers: Lets your brand “take over” TikTok for the day. You can create images, GIFs, and videos with embedded links to landing pages or hashtag challenges. These ads can be 3-second photos or 3.5-second videos, so you have to be ready to craft something powerful. Doing a brand takeover will mean that your business will show up as soon as users open the app, so you have to be prepared to pay for that privilege: these ads are much more expensive than in-feed ads, especially if you choose TopView ads, which can be 5-60 seconds, and allow viewers to engage with them.
Hashtag Challenges: As pointed out above, you can create your own hashtag challenges, or you can pay to use promoted hashtags to get more engagement.

Create branded lenses or filters

As on Snapchat, you can create lenses and filters on TikTok – and you can brand them! Your filters and lenses will stay live for 10 days, and users will be able to add them to their content. That means all the followers of the users who incorporate your filters/lenses will also see your brand, making this a unique way to build brand awareness.

Marketing your brand can feel overwhelming these days. It’s no longer as simple as creating a print ad or one-off commercial, you’ve got to be out there engaging with potential customers online, all the time. But if you know which platforms to engage with – and more importantly, how to use them most effectively – you can reach more people than businesses of the past could ever dream of! So what do you think: is marketing on TikTok right for your business?

Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing 105

Businesses big and small all use social media to connect and communicate with their customers. Many bigger businesses pay for a social media strategist, but we believe you can handle the basics on your own! In “Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing” editions 101-104, we covered the basics of social media, building your brand, and how to gain traffic with search engine optimization. Now that you’ve got your social media profiles up and running, we’ll take the skills you’ve learned and put them to work creating high quality, desirable content for your viewers.

Experts in social media marketing agree that content is the single most important factor in your brand’s online presence. But it’s not as simple as snapping a photo and uploading it to your page. There are over 3 billion people active on social media, including your customers and colleagues. If you want your clients to engage with your content, you have to make your posts stand out.

Give The People What They Want

There’s not one formula for creating high quality content, and not one thing that makes people share a post. What works for one brand might cause your business to lose followers. You have to know your audience, and what they want. The New York Times published a study about social media engagement, highlighting factors that motivate people to share content. The study found that people use social media shares to:

woman with hijab on looking at her phone smiling — *Grab potential customers with emotional content that draws them to you.*

Define themselves to others
Engage with valuable and entertaining content
Grow and nourish relationships
Spread the word about products and causes they care about

The study also found that for people to engage with it, content must be inspirational, meaningful, or informational. Your content should convey:

Emotion: If something isn’t emotional, we tend to pass it by. Even content that fills the reader with sorrow, or fear, will gain more engagement than something shallow.

Humanity: We all crave connection! Storytelling is a great way to forge relationships virtually. Tell the story of your business, a product, or your community to create relatable content that makes people feel good when they read it.

Information: Posts that offer insight or information get shares at incredible rates, across niches and platforms. Posting how-to videos, educational blogs, or an infographic can boost your views, and establish you as an expert in your field.

The bottom line? Create authentic, evocative content and the rest will fall into place. But in case it doesn’t, we’ve compiled some of the best tips and tricks for engaging, shareable content.

Tips and Tricks

Engage, engage, engage! When someone mentions you, tags you in a post, or shares your content, respond to them as quickly as you can! That might be as simple as a thank you, or it could involve some problem-solving customer service. Either way, it shows that you care about your clients and will help to get your name out there.
Engage right away when you get a notification and do not be afraid to seek feedback!

A picture is worth 1,000 words. Humans are simple creatures. We see something attractive, we like it, we share it. It really is that simple: posts with images are 150% more likely to be shared than those with just text. They also have an engagement rate that is 40% higher than posts without images.

Don’t be afraid to go live. People love engaging with live action. Studies show that brands who go live see views grow by 113%, so it might be time to get over your stage fright! Going live doesn’t have to be a scripted performance. You can pop on quickly to introduce a new product or service or give a demonstration, or go for a lengthier live post showing “a day in the life” or a tour of your workspace.
Seek feedback. Customers love to have their voices heard. Try hosting an “Ask Me Anything”, posting a poll, or sending out a survey.

Put a face on it. Keep it personal by highlighting the individuals who make your businesses tick. You can share a client success story, or post a weekly staff profile.

Share customer content. Sharing content from your community shows that you value their posts, and gives you a break from creating your own content. You can ask people to share photos of your product or service using your branded hashtag, and then reshare their creative images. Since user-generated content is voluntarily produced by real-life consumers, it feels more authentic, and can boost your credibility.

It’s a well known fact that social media trends come and go. Videos and blogs go viral for about a week, and the creators are never heard from again. But the strategies we have given you are tried and true, and will help you keep creating content that gets noticed and shared. These tips and tricks will help you form human connections with your customers and community, and these connections will last much longer than a video of a grumpy cat.

Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing 104

Social media is a powerful tool for communication with and connection to your customers. In this multi-part series we have been covering the basics of social media for businesses. In this edition, we’ll dive deeper into gaining website traffic and online visibility for businesses using Search Engine Optimization.

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is the key to brand visibility, but it’s complicated. Experts in digital marketing, web engineering, and data sciences have dedicated their entire careers to this field. The information we have here will give you a basic understanding of what search engine optimization is, and how you can use it to boost your business. the word SEO with different seo related words around it

What is Search Engine Optimization?

SEO refers to increasing the quantity and quality of website traffic through organic (non-paid) search engine results.
SEO goes beyond just what people type into Google. Understanding how to optimize your pages for search engines relies on a deeper understanding of what people are searching for online, the words they use, and the types of answers and content they’re seeking.
To increase traffic, you want your content to appear on the right search engine result pages. It doesn’t matter if your page is high ranking for a specific keyword, if the user isn’t getting what they need from it. Search Engine Optimization helps make sure your pages are showing up in the right searches.

Do, Know, Go

To understand SEO, you must know what people are searching for, as well as how and why they are searching for these things. Search Engine Optimization experts categorize the things people search for into three distinct categories: do, know, and go searches.

Do: “Do” searches are typically made with the goal of completing a transaction, like purchasing a product or service. An example of a “do” search is “flight to Fiji.” This is a “do” because it leads to the action of purchasing a flight to Fiji.
Know: “Know” searches are information-seeking searches, and while they may be related to product research and future transactions, they don’t have the same transactional nature as “do” searches. For example, “best resort in Fiji” is a “know”search, though it might lead to a later “do” search to book the resort.
Go: “Go” searches involve users looking for a specific website, such as that of a brand or organization. For example, if a user searches for the Bintan Resort in Fiji, they should be brought directly to that resort’s home page. Suggesting other Bintan resorts would not be helpful.

Your SEO Toolkit

Once you understand the basics of how search engines work and what types of queries are driving traffic to your website and social media pages, there are a few tools that you can use to make sure people are being driven to your site or content:

Hashtags are used across all social media platforms, and enhance the users’ ability to find your content. Hashtags are most effective when you want to tie your post to a current event, trend, industry, or location. For example, #OpenInBOS is a hashtag that trends every winter in Boston, Massachusetts to help consumers find restaurants that are open during snow storms. #MondayMotivation is a widely-used hashtag for inspiring content. Figure out what hashtags are best for you by researching what similar businesses use, and by exploring hashtags related to your field.
Tags are different from hashtags, though they serve a similar purpose. They are specific and detailed descriptions of your content. Viewers browse by tags, but they’re not as time-sensitive, event-focused, or specific as hashtags. For example, a viewer might search for “bridal hair styles”, and they would see content tagged “bridal”, “hair styles”, and “bridal hairstyles”. Each post can have multiple tags, but not all platforms use tags. They are primarily used by YouTube, Facebook, and Pinterest.
Keywords are the words or phrases used when searching, and relate to your brand, product, or service. On your end, they play a large part in categorizing websites, and can increase relevant search traffic when used correctly. For the user, they help specify what they’re trying to do, learn, or visit. The first step to properly using keywords is to brainstorm what people might search for to find your page, and incorporating that into your titles, descriptions, and content.

Links refer to the number of times a page has been referenced on a different website. When another website links back to your page, it shows that they appreciate and approve of your content, which helps your pages rank higher on search engines. This does happen organically as people find and re-share your pages, but it can also be achieved through partnerships and reviews.

Search Engine Optimization is an incredibly detailed, ever-evolving field. Because search engines are constantly updating their software and algorithms, it can be difficult to keep up. But you don’t need to be an SEO expert to use it to your advantage – even a beginner can succeed with SEO! Use these tools to support your high-quality content, and you will gain more visibility for your business.

Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing 103

Thanks to social media, connection and communication has never been easier. Companies are building personalized relationships with clients through social media platforms, using online marketing strategies, digital events and sales, and even managing customer service through social media. Tech-savvy business owners are using social media to network and engage with customers locally and internationally. With our social media marketing series, you can too.

In Social Media Marketing 101, we covered forming a mission statement and introduced the 6 major social media platforms. We also looked at how social media can be used to boost your business, research your competition, and even form partnerships. In Social Media Marketing 102, we discussed creating profiles, finding the voice of your brand, and using social media effectively. Now that you have an identity and presence, it’s time to increase your visibility across social media platforms and draw in new clients.

What is visibility?

“Increasing visibility” means exactly what it sounds like: getting your pages seen. You’ve dedicated time and energy to creating social media profiles and coming up with engaging content. Now it’s time to be sure that people are actually seeing your hard work! When a consumer searches for keywords related to your field, you want your profiles to show up as a result. Here are some helpful ways to expand your reach and draw fresh faces into your online community.

Choose the right time to post

We touched on timing in Social Media Marketing 102, but this is worth repeating: timing is key. Social networking platforms use algorithms based on engagement (meaning clicks, likes, and shares) to determine how your posts are ranked in search engines (more about this later!). The more people engage with your posts and pages, the higher their ranking is. So, you’ll want to bolster engagement by posting during peak social media traffic hours:

Morning: 5-7 am. Many people wake up to an alarm on their phone, and spend the first few minutes of their day checking in on social media accounts, or scrolling while sipping their coffee.
Lunch hour: 12-2 pm. Students and employees will often browse social media during lunch breaks to escape the classroom or office for a while.

Evening: 5-7pm. After work many people enjoy decompressing by tuning in to social media. This is one of the best times to capture their attention, as people commute home or look for distractions from their daily worries and evening chores.

Late night: 9-11pm. Studies show that more and more people use social media at night to relax and unwind before bed.

These time frames are only relative to your local time zone. If your business takes place internationally or across time zones, you’ll have to consider timing your posts correctly. There are many free automated post scheduling resources available, like Hootsuite, Buffer, or Crowdfire that can help if you want to cater to a time zone that is vastly different from yours.

Create useful, exciting content

This might seem obvious, but if you want to increase the number of people viewing your content, it needs to be high quality, interesting, and useful. People should want to watch and share it.

For 2020, the top-trending content is video.This might be “brand stories” that highlight the consumer experience, informational how-to videos, live Q&A chats, or inspiring motivational videos.
People enjoy educational content that adds value to their life. Consumers want to know that you’re an expert, and they want to feel a little like an expert, too. Teach them something and they’re likely to share it with their own network, spreading your name via word of mouth (or tweet!).
High quality content is worth the work! You want to “wow” your online community. Try using bright, beautiful infographics or quotes, unique photographs, and high-resolution videography to make your content stand out.

Incentivize Sharing

Increase visibility by offering sharing incentives such as discounts or free shipping.

In addition to creating exciting, beautiful, and useful content, you can also increase the return on your content by encouraging viewers to share it with their networks. Here are some ways to incentivize sharing:

Offer an in-house discount, free shipping, or extra entry into a contest for sharing a social media post.
Host an engagement campaign: For every like/comment/share, your business can donate money or time to a foundation you care about.
Re-posting people’s commentary on your content is an easy way to let your viewers know you’ve heard what they’re saying and that you value their feedback.
Have employees include social media icons in their email signatures and social media profiles. Encourage them to share posts with their own networks.

Social media marketing can be an uphill battle. Sometimes it might seem like you’re at mercy of unknown powers, but you can take matters into your own hands. Following these tips for posting timely, engaging content, encouraging sharing, and understanding a little bit about algorithms and SEO is the first step toward mastering social media marketing.

Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing 102

We live in an age of digital connection. Many companies use online marketing strategies to engage with consumers, promote events and sales, and manage customer service. For business owners, an active and robust social media presence can draw in customers from far and wide.

In Social Media Marketing 101, we covered forming a mission statement and introduced the 6 major social media platforms. We also looked at how social media can be used to boost your business, spread the word, research your competition, and even form partnerships. Now, we’ll dive a little deeper by finding out how to create your profile, find your voice, and use social media most effectively.

Building your brand

Your brand should be a cohesive and consistent set of content, images, colors, styles, and language.

Now that you’ve done a little bit of background research, selected your preferred social media platforms, and formed your mission statement, it’s time to build your brand. Social media offers a unique opportunity to show your business’ personality and give potential clients the chance to “meet” you.

It’s important that potential clients engaging with your platforms know who you are and what you offer. Your brand should be a cohesive and consistent set of content, images, colors, styles, and language. It all starts with creating a profile – the landing page for your social media consumers. It should be easy to understand, visually appealing, and simple to navigate.

Creating a Profile

Be consistent. Use the same name across all platforms, as close to your business name as possible. Doing this allows followers to easily find you. Consider using “Businessname_YourCity” if your first choice is taken.
Streamline your profiles. Use the same profile image anywhere you have a registered account. The best profile picture will be a high quality, high-resolution image. Your logo would be the best choice. This consistency will start to build visual recognition with consumers.
Link your profiles. Many platforms allow you to link to your other business pages when creating a new profile. Co-promote all of your business accounts to give your new audience the chance to follow you on other social networks.

Find your voice

If your brand was a person, what would you want them to say? The product or services your business offers plays a role in determining the voice of your brand. You should also consider the target audience, and make sure you’re speaking their language.

Consider the following when planning the voice of your brand:

Purpose: What do you want to do with your social media presence? Do you want to use social media to connect with clients and form a community? Then try telling a story about your product. Hoping to educate consumers? In that case it’s better to share facts and current research.
Tone: The style of your social posts says a lot about your brand. Are you lighthearted and optimistic? Formal and educational? Funny and sarcastic? Whatever it is, your style should remain consistent – and respectful.
Language: This ties back to knowing your demographic. A business targeting younger consumers might want to use memes or slang. An educational brand should use industry-specific language or acronyms.
Reason: Don’t post just for the sake of posting! Stick to planned and scheduled content that is engaging, accurate, and up-to-date. Most consumers cite “boring” or “meaningless” content as the main reason they unfollow pages, second only to “too many ads”.

Calendar, Content, and Connection

Create a calender and schedule when to posts for each social media platform.

When and how you engage with social media is just as important as finding the right voice for your brand. Taking the time to come up with a content schedule, as well as to engage with feedback, is critical in the social media world.

Create a calendar: The amount you should post will vary by platform. Some marketing specialists will tell you that Twitter should be used at least once a day, Facebook no more than 3 times a week, and Instagram twice a week. Remember, if you wait too long between posts, people can forget about you. If you post too frequently, people might feel bombarded. Timing your posts also matters. Studies show that optimal posting times are generally during consumers’ lunch breaks (12-1pm) and after work hours (5-7pm). You should aim to post in those time frames.
Curate your content: A good rule of thumb for content is the 80/20 format. 80% of your content should be to inform, entertain, or connect with your audience. The other 20% should be for promoting your products or services. You don’t have to come up with all of your own, original content. You can repost relevant information from similar organizations or experts in the field. Just be sure to read what you’re posting. Once it is on your page, you are responsible for people’s reactions.
Review and engage: If you don’t reply to feedback or reviews, you miss opportunities to connect with customers. Schedule a few times a week (or more!) to check in on your social media. Use this time to respond to direct messages, thank clients for their reviews, answer any questions, and engage with posts from other businesses in your field.

Social media marketing might seem daunting, but it can be enjoyable. It is an easy way to connect with consumers, expand your business, and interact with other professionals in the field. Take it seriously and be thoughtful about what you post, but don’t be afraid to have fun! In the next part of Social Media Marketing 101, we’ll discuss how to increase your brand’s visibility, expand reach, and draw in new clients.

Building Your Brand: Social Media Marketing 101

We live in an age of digital connection. Many brands and companies use online marketing strategies to engage with consumers, to market events and sales, and even to manage customer service. For business owners, an active and robust social media presence can draw in customers from far and wide. In this three part series on social media marketing for beginners, we’ll cover the basics of social media and how to build your social media presence across three major platforms: Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. This will include an introduction to social media, building your brand, and increasing platform traffic.

It’s important to have a vision of your company and it’s mission statement.

Where To Start?

No matter how far you are in your business journey, it’s important to have a mission statement. You should be able to describe, in a few sentences, your goals (what you hope to create or achieve), your value (what product or services you offer), and what sets you apart from your competition (your inspiration, why you are the best choice). Take a moment to think about it: can you do that?

Next figure out what your goals are for using social media. Are you hoping to establish yourself as an expert in your field? Do you want to build relationships and a community with your clients? Are you looking for new partnerships or employees? Your goals will inform which social media platforms you focus on.

Social Media Platforms

Facebook: This is the ‘original’ platform. Most businesses should start here: many clients already have a Facebook account, and it’s set up in a way that actually supports small businesses, by offering reviews, feedback, and direct client communications
Twitter: Twitter is a platform for short-form communications: it’s posts are limited to 280 characters. Many businesses use it to update clients on sales, new products, and current events as they pertain to their industries.
Instagram: Instagram, a photo-based platform with no character limit, focuses on visual marketing. This is great for eye-catching flyers, thoughtful product displays, and service vignettes.
Pinterest: Pinterest is a share-and-discover platform that is visually focused, but not as streamlined as instagram. Pinterest features an image linked to a webpage, such as a meal linked to a blog with the recipe. The platform allows users to save (“pin”) the image to save for later or share with others. There are some industries for which this platform is very effective, such as food services and events, hair and makeup, fashion, interior design, and blogging.
YouTube: YouTube is a video platform that has been around since 2006. While there’s a good amount of nonsense on it, there are also great opportunities for marketing for those with a solid strategy. Tutorials, reviews, and q-and-a’s are great options for YouTube.
LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a professional networking platform, used for sharing your own work or new events in your field. It can also be used for recruiting employees or partners. Everyone should have two LinkedIn accounts: a personal profile and one for their business.

Brand Research

When branding yourself, make sure you use good marketing strategy. It’s important to build and maintain relationships with peers instead of increasing competition.

Once you identify which platforms are most beneficial to your brand’s mission, it’s time to do your research.

Follow similar brands on your preferred platforms to get an idea of what kind of content is resonating with consumers. Remember that for independent businesses, it’s important to build and maintain relationships with peers instead of increasing competition. You can share their content, which can show consumers that you’re committed to supporting your field. This can create a sense of kinship with the other business – which in turn might influence them to share your content.
Create your own content schedule. This can be as simple as taking a blank calendar format and filling it in with ideas for the month so you don’t draw a blank when it comes time to create a post. You can also utilize a publishing software to pre-plan your posts.
Keep tabs on the people frequenting your pages – they are your community. The goal is to have the people consuming your content actually engage with it.
As this is an extension of your customer service, be sure to respond to questions, comments, reviews, and direct messages in a timely manner. Thank users for their time, and offer responses that reflect your brand’s values.
Use your social media accounts to announce new products or business developments, gain customer feedback, promote events or sales, and most importantly provide a positive customer experience.

Getting To Know You

You should spend a little time getting to know how each of these platforms work, exploring other brands and businesses, and formulating your own mission statement. Find inspiration in the posts of your competitors. Begin to visualize what your social media branding will look like. In the next part of this series we’ll address how to build your brand and presence online.