Social media provides an accessible and cost-effective way to market your business. Here are seven ways that social media marketing could benefit your brand.

1  Better brand awareness

A strong presence on social media will help you reach a wider audience, find new business and increase brand awareness.

Social media also offers an opportunity to establish your company as a “thought leader” or authority in your field. Use your platforms to share useful information, advice and news, and you can become a reliable source of industry knowledge while building trust in your brand.

2  Direct engagement with customers

Unlike traditional advertising, social media marketing allows you to have a conversation with customers. Followers can communicate directly with you, and you can engage with them in return by responding to messages and replying to comments and questions.

This direct interaction can show the human face of your brand and demonstrate the values at the heart of your business. Give followers an insight into how your company works behind the scenes, or profile the people in your business to develop a more human connection with your customers.

3  Opportunities for market research

Each social network offers a wealth of data about your customers that can be used to inform your marketing strategy. Built-in analytics tools allow you to clearly see the demographic of the people interacting with your brand, giving you greater insight into who your customers are and how to market to them.

Social media is also a key tool when carrying out competitor analysis. Visit other brands’ pages to assess their approach and to see how their own followers are engaging with what they post. This can offer great lessons in what works, and also what doesn’t.

4  Increased traffic to your website

Whether through posts or ads, social media is an effective way to drive more traffic to your website. Sharing content like blog posts or highlighting new products can encourage clicks while also keeping customers up to date with your brand.

Make sure your website address is linked prominently in the bio or about section of your profile. This is particularly important on Instagram, as only the link in the bio is clickable and links in captions don’t work. You could also update your Instagram bio link temporarily if you have a product you want to showcase or a seasonal focus for your marketing campaign.

5  More targeted advertising

Social media advertising allows you to be selective about who you market to, making it more cost-effective as you only pay to reach your target customers. Ads can be targeted based on a variety of factors including demographic, location and interests, and you can tailor the content of your ads to match.

Remarketing is another benefit of social media, and allows you to target customers who have visited your website and viewed your products, but left before making a purchase. Using tools like Facebook pixel, you can show them social media ads for the products they have already viewed or considered buying, encouraging them to complete the sale.

6  Stronger promotion of content

Sharing branded content on your social media channels is one of the best ways to get it seen by customers and encourage traffic to your website.

Social media should be a key part of your content marketing strategy, and will help ensure that the well-researched, authoritative content you are producing reaches a wider audience – strengthening your brand’s position as an industry authority.

You can also source content ideas and material through your social media channels. Let your followers inform the kind of content you produce by asking them what they want to see, or create a competition or hashtag to gather user-generated content that you can reshare.

7  Improved customer service

Social media makes it easier to see what customers are saying about you online, and allows you to respond to feedback directly. By highlighting positive reviews and testimonials, and addressing any issues or complaints professionally and quickly, you can ensure that your online reputation remains healthy.

People are likely to send queries and ask questions via your social media profiles, and this makes them an important customer support tool. Regularly check for and respond to messages and comments, and if you can’t offer out-of-hours support via social media, use automated away messages and display your customer service hours clearly on your profile.

Contact Unity Online to explore in more detail how social media marketing could benefit your business.