UNIT II
Social Media Marketing
Manoj Mishra
Introduction
Social media marketing is the process of creating content for
social media platforms to promote your products and/or
services, build community with your target audience, and
drive traffic to your business. With new features and platforms
emerging every day, social media marketing is constantly
evolving.
Social media marketing is all about meeting your target
audience and customers where they are and as they socially
interact with each other and your brand.
Social Media Marketing Platforms
1. Facebook
• Users: 1.9 billion daily active users worldwide
• Audience: An even spread of Generation X and Millennials
• Industry impact: B2C
• Best for: Brand awareness; advertising
Facebook is the largest social media platform and the most
established. Since its launch in 2004, it has become an
invaluable tool for B2C businesses, offering advanced
advertising tools as well as organic opportunities.
2. Twitter
• Users: 211 million daily active users worldwide
• Audience: Primarily Millennials
• Best for: Public relations; customer service; community
building
While Instagram focuses on visuals, Twitter focuses on words.
Since the early days of 140-character Tweets, the platform has
now expanded to include an audio tool called Twitter Spaces, a
community-building tool called Twitter Communities,
and Twitter Moments to share interesting content with your
followers.
2. TikTok
• Users: 1 billion active monthly global users
• Audience: Primarily Gen Z followed by Millennials
• Industry impact: B2B and B2C
• Best for: Short-form, creative video content; user-generated
content; brand awareness
When you think of short-form video, you probably think of TikTok.
The platform rose in popularity in 2020 and shows no signs of
slowing down. It's one of the best platforms for community building,
with marketers ranking it in second place behind YouTube.
3. Instagram
• Users: 1 billion monthly active users
• Audience: Primarily Millennials
• Industry impact: B2C
• Best for: High-quality images and videos; user-generated
content; advertising
Today, users can discover brands, browse their products and/or
service, and complete a purchase without ever leaving the app
– making Instagram a hard platform to beat.
4. Twitter
• Users: 211 million daily active users worldwide
• Audience: Primarily Millennials
• Industry impact: B2B and B2C
• Best for: Public relations; customer service; community building
While Instagram focuses on visuals, Twitter focuses on words. Since
the early days of 140-character Tweets, the platform has now
expanded to include an audio tool called Twitter Spaces, a
community-building tool called Twitter Communities, and Twitter
Moments to share interesting content with your followers.
5. LinkedIn
• Users: 774 million active users worldwide
• Audience: Baby boomers, Generation X, and Millennials
• Industry impact: B2B
• Best for: B2B relationships, business development, and social
selling
LinkedIn is Facebook's professional cousin. It's perhaps the only
platform where its audience is clearly defined: Working
professionals looking to network and seek out new opportunities.
That makes it the ideal platform for B2B companies looking to
identify key decision-makers and build an industry-specific
community.
6. YouTube
• Users: Over 315 million daily active users worldwide
• Audience: Primarily Millennials but has a strong audience across
gender and age demographics
• Industry impact: B2C and B2B
• Best for: Brand awareness; long-form entertainment, and how-to
videos
According to HootSuite, YouTube is the second most visited website in
the world. In addition, marketers name it the best platform to build
community.
In addition to being an incredibly popular platform, its users also tend to
stay longer on it because it features mostly long-form content – making
it an ideal platform to share educational content.
7. Snapchat
• Users: 306 million daily active users worldwide
• Audience: Primarily Generation Z
• Industry impact: B2C
• Best for: Brand awareness; advertising
When Snapchat came out in 2011, leading the charge in ephemeral
content. It introduced content that you could share with your friends
and that would expire after 24 hours.
The platform peaked in 2015 and has held strong since then. Many
thought the brand would disappear once Instagram introduced
Stories, the same feature with a different name. However, Snapchat
continues to be popular among young adults.
Pinterest
Think of Pinterest like a visual storyboard that allows users to
get inspiration for everything from fashion to home decor.
85% of Pinners say Pinterest is where they go to start a new
project.
In addition, 80% of weekly Pinners say they've discovered a
new brand or product on the platform.
So, not only is it a great discovery tool but it's also a way for
brands to build their narrative through visual stories.
Benefits of Social Media Marketing
There are a variety of reasons why your company should use social media
marketing. We've created a list of the four most beneficial reasons to consider.
Let's dive in.
1. Increase your brand awareness.
Due to the sheer amount of people on social media, you're missing out on the
potential to reach thousands, and even millions, if you don't have a presence.
In fact, social media has been proven to boost brand awareness by driving up
engagement. Social engagement includes things like comments, likes, shares,
and reposts, and saves.
It also helps you increase brand awareness by directing traffic straight to your
site. You can do this by including direct links to your website in your profile, bio,
and posts.
Benefits of Social Media Marketing
2. Generate leads and boost conversions.
Here are some examples of ways you can use social media to generate
more leads.
• Create contests for your visitors and followers to participate in on your
social media profiles.
• Include links to your website and offers in the bio sections of your
profiles.
• Host live videos to make announcements about products and provide
updates or details about exciting news at your company.
• Implement a social media marketing campaign on one of your
channels.
• Sell your products through your social profiles.
Benefits of Social Media Marketing
3. Foster relationships with your customers.
By connecting and engaging with your social media
followers, you'll be able to build lasting relationships
between them and your business. You can do this by
interacting with them on your posts, responding to their
questions and comments, and providing them with any
help they may need.
You can also ask your followers questions about your
products, their pain points, or create giveaways to help you
build trust and show them how much you value their input
and support.
4. Learn from your competitors.
Social media allows you to get a look at what is and isn't
working for your competition, and therefore helps you
decide what should or shouldn't change in terms
of your company's approach.
Lastly, reviewing the social accounts of your competitors
can help you make sure your marketing stands out and is
unique to your brand.
How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy
1. Research your buyer personas and audience.
2. Determine which social platforms you'll market on.
3. Create unique and engaging content.
4. Organize a schedule for your posts.
Step 1: Research your buyer personas and audience.
The first step to creating a social media marketing strategy is to
determine who your buyer personas and audience are so you can
target their needs and interests appropriately.
To do this, think about the people you're trying to reach and why,
and how you would classify them as a group. For example, if your
company sells trendy leggings and joggers, you might classify
your target audience as millennials who like to wear stylish
athletic apparel regularly — a style known as athleisure.
By considering your buyer personas and audience, you'll then be
able to determine what content will attract the type of followers
and customers you hope to gain. Plus, learn how to create
engaging content to keep your followers interested.
Step 2: Determine which social platforms you'll market on.
Stephanie Morgan, founder and CEO of social media
agency Social Lock, echoes this sentiment.
"Think about their behaviors and where they hang out online. If
that's Pinterest, use that platform for your brand. If that's TikTok,
use that platform for your brand," Morgan adds. "Don't waste time
on a platform that your ideal client avatar is not very active on."
"It's important to be where your audience of potential customers is
today, and where they might be tomorrow," said Andrew
Delaney, former social media marketing manager at HubSpot.
"It's better to be ahead of the curve than behind."
Step 3: Create unique and engaging content.
With the billions of social media users around the globe, there's no question
that at least some of your followers — or the people browsing your profile —
have also seen your competitor's content or that of other businesses in your
industry.
That's why you must have engaging social media content that stands out and
provides viewers with a reason to click that "Follow" button and interact with
your brand.
Not sure what's considered engaging? Morgan has a recommendation.
"My number one tip to brands for creating engaging content on social media
is to do market research first because what will be engaging depends on the
audience," Morgan said. "When you know what your audience likes and
needs to know, you can create content that engages those interests."
Continue…
Lastly, leverage trends. Social media trends are always
coming up, especially on short-form video platforms like
TikTok. Don't be afraid to join in but you still have to be
intentional about how you do it.
"If the trend started happening three weeks ago, you've
probably missed the boat," Morgan said. "Catching the trends
early is the best way to capitalize on it without coming across
as inauthentic or like you're trying too hard, or worse [as]
'chuegy' – see Gen Z for that one."
Step 4: Organize a schedule for your posts.
One of the easiest ways to ensure your content is shared as
planned is to use a social media management solution. These
tools allow you to write captions, prepare pictures and videos,
and schedule posts in advance.
They also automatically share your content on schedule and
monitor all post interactions and engagement for you. Social
media management solutions save you time and allow you to
focus on your other tasks.
E.g. HubSpot , Sprout Social, Hootsuite
How to Analyze Your Social Media Marketing Impact and
Results
One of the most important aspects of social media marketing is
ensuring your efforts are successful in helping you meet your
goals. To determine this, you'll need to keep track of all of your
posts, on every channel. You can do this by reviewing and
managing your social media metrics.
Social Media Metrics
Social media metrics are data related to the success of your
posts and your impact on your audience and customers on
various platforms. These metrics may include data about your
level of engagement, likes, follows, shares, and all other
interactions on each platform.
Here are 10 of the most important metrics for you to track:
1. Engagement: This includes clicks, comments, likes, and
replies on your social media posts. There are also platform-
specific types of engagement such as "Saved" posts on
Instagram and "Pinned" posts on Pinterest.
2. Reach: The number of people who have seen any content
associated with your page or profile is your reach.
3. Followers: This is the number of people you have on your
profile who have clicked your "Follow" button and see your
content in their feeds regularly.
4. Impressions: This is the number of times a post from your
profile or page is seen, whether or not your audience members
click on it. This is often what happens when someone is
scrolling through their newsfeed, but not clicking on anything.
5. Video views: On Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, or any
other social channel with video capabilities, this is the number
of views each gets.
6. Profile visits: The number of people who have opened your
social media page is your number of profile visits.
7. Mentions: This is the number of times your profile has been
mentioned by audience members in their posts.
8. Tags: This is when your audience adds the name of your
company's profile or your hashtag to another post.
9. Reposts: This is when a member of your audience posts a
piece of your content on their profile.
10. Shares: These are the posts your followers and audience
take from your profile and share with their network.
Morgan adds that the metrics you focus on will depend on
which season you're in. Here's her formula:
• If you're new, focus on building an audience and
awareness. Key metrics: reach, impressions, audience
growth.
• If you're growing, focus on building trust. Key metrics:
Likes, saves, comments, DMs.
• If you're established, focus on retaining and nurturing. Key
metrics: Likes, saves, comments, DMs.
• If you're launching something, focus on selling. Key
metrics: DMs and clickthrough rate
How to Measure Social Media Metrics
You can review social media metrics in a variety of ways, For
example, you can use the analytics tools built into the various
platforms you use. Here are a few examples:
• Twitter Analytics
• Facebook Analytics
• Instagram Insights
You might also choose to use an analytics and tracking tool such
as Google Analytics. This is a great option if you want to track
your social media and website metrics. Lastly, many social media
scheduling solutions — as we reviewed earlier — have monitoring
and tracking features automatically built-in.
How to Write a Blog Post
Blog post is any piece of writing published on a blog or the
blog section of an established website. These can be articles,
diary entries, or informational guides, and they usually include
relevant images, infographics, videos, and other
miscellaneous media.
Each post has a goal or theme, and is written in the voice of
the blogger
Types of Blog Posts
The one thing that ties all blog posts together is that they are
all published on blogs. Besides that, they are all wildly
different.
How-To
How-to blog posts often include lists or step-by-step instructions. This lets the
readers know how to do whatever the task is fairly quickly and easily,
breaking down the monumental goal into smaller, more manageable steps.
If you want to write a blog post like this, you'll need to be well-versed in how
to do something specific. Whether that's speaking a language, building a car,
or even tying your shoes, you need to be able to explain the process in detail
for your readers.
List-Based
List-based blog posts aim to inform the reader about several
options at once. For example, QuillBot has posted a few list-
based posts that include "Top 9 English Grammar Resources
Online" and "The 9 Essential Elements of a Cover Letter +
Templates, Examples, and Tips."
News Article
Remember when we said all blog posts have one thing in
common, and that thing is being posted on a blog? This is a
great example. A news article has to be posted on a blogging
platform in order to be considered a news article blog.
These typically look exactly like regular news articles, with
exciting headlines and details down below.
Interview
Interview blog posts usually consist of an introduction /
overview of the interviewee, and then the question and
answer portion of the interview, followed by a short
conclusion.
Review
There are two types of review blog posts: sponsored and non-sponsored.
Bloggers get compensated for sponsored reviews, whether that comes in the
form of money or free products. Sponsored reviews are great because you
know the blogger has used the product, but they can also be biased toward
the company sponsoring the post.
Non-sponsored reviews are done not for compensation, but to tell the truth /
give an opinion on a particular product. In these instances, bloggers are
giving their unbiased thoughts on a product or service without being
compensated or monitored in any way.
Personal
Personal blog posts are basically online diaries. They are
used to update readers on the blogger's life, sharing intimate
thoughts and personal photos.
Personal blogs can vary a lot in what they look like, because
it all depends on the taste of the blogger and how they want
to present themselves to the world. There is no set of
standards or guidelines for personal blogs.
Explainer
Similar to the how-to blog post, the explainer blog post is
used to educate readers.
Instead of teaching the audience how to do something, they
explain a concept, idea, or phenomenon.
Image-based
Little catches a reader's attention like an image.
This type of blog post has little text, and is made up of
visuals, primarily. These visuals can include photographs,
drawings, graphs, infographics, etc.
How to Start a Blog
Determine What Topics You'll Cover
Check Out Your Competition
Understand Your Audience
Identify Your Unique Angle
Name Your Blog
Create Your Blog Domain
Choose a CMS and Set Up Your Blog
CMS stands for content management system, and it basically lets
you run a website without having to know how to code.
Customize the Look of Your Blog
By customizing your blog, you're making it your own and
allowing it to stand out from other blogs of the same nature.
Remember the "finding your angle" step? Well, this is part of
that.
Pick colors, fonts, and images that you think represents
yourself and your topics well. This will be the first thing people
notice once they arrive at your blog!
Write Your First Blog Post
Step 1: Think About Your Writing Goals
Step 2:Build Out Each Section
Step 3: Get Writing!
Step 4: Figure Out What’s Missing
Step 5: Settle On a Title
Step 6: Make Your Final Changes and Publish
Blog Format Guidelines
The way your blog is formatted will determine how Google
(and other various search engines) reads and ranks your
content, which will have a huge impact on how many people
see your blog at all.
Here are some tips and tricks on proper formatting.
Include H2s to Arrange Your Ideas
H2 tags are used to break up your content. Think of them as
subheadings: each one represents a certain element of your
main topic, and will be explained further in the text below
each tag.
H tags are essential for good search engine optimization, or
SEO. These tags allow search engines to understand what
kind of content you're producing and how to rank this content.
Center Your Images
This one is pretty obvious. You want your blog to look nice.
You wouldn't invite company over if your house was a mess,
would you?
People like symmetry. They like uncluttered web pages. By
centering the images you use in your posts, you're ensuring,
as best you can, that your loyal readers will enjoy looking at
the visuals you've added to your blog. They might spend
more time on your blog because of this, or even tell their
friends about it.
Add Alt Text
Alt text for images is used for accessibility purposes, ensuring
that those who cannot see the images on your blog will still be
able to gain the benefits of those images.
The alt text should briefly describe exactly what the image is,
and if there is any text included in the image.
This step can also aid in search engine optimization
purposes.
Keep Your Sentences Short and Concise
Short sentences are easier to read and understand, for both
humans and search engine crawlers. Not every sentence has
to be short, but most of them should be a reasonable length.
You'll want your content to be as easy to read as possible.
Use Media with a Purpose
Your blog posts should be cohesive. This helps with gaining
an audience and also with search engine optimization.
You should add images and videos that are relevant to the
topic(s) you're writing about. They should underline and
illustrate your points in order to help readers understand
everything better.
