In business, one of the things that often gets neglected is how to properly handle social media. Should entrepreneurs focus on long-term trends? Are these trends worth the investment in the first place? How will you know if a social media service is a good one? Read the points below for some tips.

Know the Importance of Commitment

Before anything, businesses and entrepreneurs should commit first to social media.

Using social media for business will normally come with challenges, just like any other means of marketing. It is not easy to have an audience and keep them involved. One more challenging aspect of it is crafting great content.

This is the reason why many brands quit in their social media marketing efforts after just a few months of getting started.

Researches suggest that it will roughly take a year to learn how to handle social media with some skills. It will take time to know how to create content with consistency and gauge whether your target audience resonates with and what they do not.

This is where the planning begins. What are the strategies you have in mind? To hold your business accountable, jot them down. It is of the utmost importance to include a fundamental company mission statement, content plan and goals in your strategy. Aside from that, include a strong statement on “why” people would follow you on social media, what kind of content you plan on creating and posting, and what you hope to achieve.

Present your true personality

Your second concern is to show the real you or your authenticity on social media.

Take a second to think about the brands that you follow on social media. What makes them special? What makes you follow them?

Chances are, there is something special about the content they post or in the way they post it. By doing so, they show that they have a personality and are not just brand robots producing content.

Creating a great social media presence is not only about showing the service to your audience or the value of your product as it is also about connection and experiences. The best brands out there share a common point of view with their fans.

Prioritize in knowing your customer’s needs

A great social media program does not aim to promote but to listen to the needs of the audience.

Social media offers a remarkable, open-ended platform that businesses can use to communicate and engage with customers. That is why we recommend using it that way!

These days, customers are taking advantage of social media as a platform to express their concerns. The better you get at social media, the more engagement you will get, and in turn, more comments. So get ready for an influx of appreciation from your followers!

Use your customers as an inspiration when crafting content. Many businesses generate content ideas by looking at the questions people frequently ask. When you cannot think of a good topic, see your customer’s concerns first before getting ideas elsewhere.

There is nothing wrong in checking out your competitor’s page and see their customer’s concerns. To help you find the trends, take advantage of tools such as Twitter Lists, BuzzSumo, and Facebook Pages to Watch.

Pick a few networks and focus on them

It is tempting to post on all social media networks. But remember that you might lack the resources to post on each and every network out there.

You might exhaust your efforts trying to post content on each platform, only to end up with average results. You will eventually realize that it’s not worthwhile.

What you should do instead is concentrate on the two to three social media networks that provide you the best return on investment (ROI). Producing a useful and engaging content for every platform should be your priority.

For instance, writing a copy with your LinkedIn audience in mind is entirely different from your approach posting on Facebook and other platforms.

When there’s passion, there’s success

Above all, do not forget that your passion towards social media marketing can help you craft really great and remarkable content.

The road to your success in social media will not always be easy. If you are hardworking and creative enough, you can feel confident about your social program a year since getting started.

When you follow your passion, your efforts will not feel like a burden in the long haul. Take advantage of the fact that your content does not need to be related to your brand all the time. You do not have to do what all your competitors are doing.

Identify the topics that your audience truly likes and make a content out of it.

Test how video marketing works

Marketing your content through videos is one of the most discussed techniques in social media these days and with that, below are some of the techniques you could apply to make an awesome impressive video content.

There are marketers who will tell you that they have a hard time thinking “what” kind of videos to do for their pages. Begin with what works. Take a look at your blog content and create a video based on topics that get the most traffic.

Facebook has a “Pages to Watch” feature. You can take advantage of it to see what your competitors are doing. Your customers can serve as your asset. The key is to start with what works. Once you already have an idea when to start, it is easier to gain some determination.

The first thing you have to consider is the length. According to Facebook’s data, the most engaging videos are roughly one minute long. People also like watching that are 60 seconds long or less. In Twitter, videos with the same length are also on top of the list. This means you have to make sure your videos are short but straight to the point.

If you are planning to feature an individual or a group of individuals, make sure that you have a reliable lavalier microphone, natural lighting, and a tripod. A high-quality video can be done when you have the right lighting, camera stability, and sound.

For animated and text-only videos, find a good resource for stock video, excellent background music, and an editor for your videos. The popular sites for stock video are Pexels and Videvo. For video editing, it is Animoto.

Get the most out of your content

Getting the most out of your content is one of the most vital key aspects in social media marketing mastery.

In business, you should not just focus on marketing. You also have to take care of the products or the services you have. Therefore, it is not advisable to send out a brand new content in order to be at the top.

You can be creative and repurpose your content, so it will look new. It saves you time, which also gets you ahead of the game in a way.

Learn how to make graphics that people can share on Twitter and Facebook or even on LinkedIn. Making Instagram Stories is also a creative way to promote your post.  You can make a summary of the Instagram Story by creating a short video and promoting it on Facebook. YouTube is also a good place to start especially if you are planning to create in-depth content.

For every content you make, try to create around two to three kinds of shareable content for it. It can be a good alternative for links because some people would rather watch a video than click links. They may also qualify as a good entry for your Instagram Stories.

Boost your organic content with your audience in mind

One of the great things about using social media for your business is that you don’t need to be very proficient to be considered successful in your marketing efforts.

There is no need to put all your money on paid advertising. It will only work if you have people taking care of your social ads or if you can dedicate a lot of time to test the waters.

Posting in a traditional manner is a smart way to test how your paid ads and boosted posts will work. Your organic reach helps you identify which posts deserve paid advertising.

The most interesting part here is that it enables you to point particular users within many of the social platform ad managers.

Check out your website’s top performing post. Who are the readers? These people can be your audience. Know their location, age, as well as type of their mobile device. You can also take a look at your competitor’s audience and see what interests them.