If you could walk into a room full of people who are your ideal client, would you do it?   This is the opportunity that social media provides B2B and B2C businesses.  The problem is that most businesses promote themselves incorrectly on social media or not at all.  You would never walk into that room full of people and ask them to buy your stuff.  Just because they are your ideal client doesn’t mean they are ready to buy. You need to nurture them properly. A lot of businesses, especially B2B companies, still are not sure how to promote their business on social media.  With the right strategy, social media can be a sales opportunity for every business.  Social media will never be easier than it is today to get sales from. So, stop sitting on the fence saying it won’t work for your business. The first step to promoting your business on social media is to understand what you want out of it.  You need more than likes and shares.    So, think about…

 

What is your goal for social media?

Do you want to generate leads and sales or brand awareness?  While brand awareness is an important step in the buyer’s journey, it shouldn’t be the only goal for your social media.  Some companies may want to use it for customer service or customer success, SEO, or to share more website customers. Businesses need to make money to survive and social media is a great addition to your sales team. Whatever your goal, make sure you have a Key Performance Indicator to let you know you are on the right track and what the ROI will be.  To generate leads and sales, you will need to understand the…

 

Buyer’s Journey

This is the process someone goes through before they become a customer. Some people also call this the sales funnel.  Technically, the sales funnel and the buyer’s journey are different things, but they get mixed together.  The buyer’s journey will be different for different people, based on how much they know about the problem they are trying to solve and how much they know about your product or service.  You will need to create a series of funnels to help them through this journey.  Don’t get overwhelmed by this idea start with one and you can create more as you go.   Next, you need to know your…

 

Value proposition

What problem do you solve?  Knowing the problem you solve, what is the solution, and the results you provide?  This information will help shape your messaging.

 

Choose the right platforms

Do some research to determine which platform is best for your business. This will be based on what you do and where your ideal client or customer likes to visit. Pick one, maybe two, to get started with.  If you choose too many, you run the risk of not using any.  The exception to this is if you hire a social media marketing agency to manage your social media. They will provide you with a strategy that includes multiple platforms if you have the budget for it.  They also have experience working with many different social media sites at the same time.  In the long run, you need to be everywhere your audience is to make it easy for people to find you.

 

B2B companies often start with LinkedIn but make sure your target audience is really active there. If your target audience is architects, you should be able to find them on LinkedIn. If they are general contractors, you should try a different platform.

 

YouTube is one of the hardest platforms to get results from, but it also provides a greater return.  YouTube marketing provides more traffic over time, so you are using video it will have a longer life span because YouTube is a search platform and if your video is something people are searching for it will be viewed for many years.

 

Don’t count out Facebook and Instagram, even if you are a B2B company. This is where most of the people are. It will take a little work to find your target audience, but they are there.  The other benefit is ads are more cost-effective on Facebook and Instagram than they are on the other platforms.

 

Look at what your competitors are doing

Look at what your closest competitors are doing and then think about how you can take that to the next level.   The chances are, your competitors are not doing it right, so don’t look to them for an example of what to do. However, you can look at them to see where the bar is set so you can raise it.  I have been on many calls where I tell companies what they need to do to increase sales and they choose not to take my advice because all of their competitors are doing it another way.  Just because your competitors are doing something a certain way doesn’t mean it is working.  They, like you, are trying to figure things out, no matter how big they are.

 

Your website

This is an important part of your social media strategy because many campaigns will send people back to your website.  This means your website needs to be setup to help continue to lead your audience through the buyer’s journey.  A good website is more than a good design. The message should be the foundation of your website and it should be a properly formatted sales presentation.  If you’re not sure if your website is setup properly, I made a video training that you can watch to learn the 3 things your website needs to be a sales tool.

 

Create a calendar

Trying to create a post at the last minute is frustrating. Planning content out in advance will provide you with greater success because it will allow you to create higher quality content.  A calendar will also help you create goals and strategies to meet your goals.   It can be intimidating to look at a blank calendar and start to fill it in.  Start by picking one day each week to create one post.  By choosing one day and time each week this will help make the process more manageable. Next month do the same thing but reuse some of the content from the previous month on a different day.  So lets say you create new content every Tuesday reuse content from the previous month on Saturday.

 

Now you’re ready to create content!

Social media and the internet are oversaturated with content.  This shouldn’t discourage you but encourage you to create something better than everyone else.  You need to have the best content because social media is competitive and is hard to get business from.  Poor content will be ignored.  Choose the topics based on your customers’ or clients’ needs.  Build connections. Look for people who are asking questions about your industry and answer them.  That is how you build a connection. Thank them for leaving a comment.   For social media to work, you need to share the right content at the right time.  Don’t sell right away if you are trying to grow organically but also don’t be afraid to sell when the time is right.   Make sure to complete your user profile and talk about the benefits of following you.

 

Video

All the social media platforms love video but video marketing is the hardest of all the social media stratagies to create and even harder to do well.  Like everything I have said above, look for ways to stand out.  A video marketer will help you in this process.  You need a video marketer they will help create the right videos.  Video scripting is also more difficult than other forms of writing, so if you can afford it a scriptwriter will help you succeed faster.  Writing an email or a blog post is different than a video script.

 

Measure

Don’t worry about follows or likes.  These are secondary metrics or as I like to call them, vanity metrics.  Engagement is much more important.  100 active followers are better than 1,000 inactive followers.  Focus on primary metrics most of what you need can be found in Google Analytics or on the social media site you are using.  If you are looking for something that brings it all together I like SEM Rush you can get a free trial at this link.

 

It is going to get even harder on social media in the next 12 – 24 months because the big brands are going to wake up and start pouring advertising dollars into social media ads because they know it works.  So now it the time to get started with social media before it is no longer an option for your company.

What other question do you have about using social media to promote your business?  Leave your questions in the comment section below.

Do you need help with your social media?  Schedule a meeting with a social media advisor.