Having an active and updated social media presence is important for businesses. It serves as a free way to reach new customers, stay top-of-mind with existing ones, and helps businesses to establish authority and rank well in search results.
Social media has evolved from a teenage hangout to a multichannel media powerhouse that is used by businesses and individuals around the world. As a business owner, you know how important a strong web presence is, but websites are no longer the only way to reach your customers online. Whether you’re looking for new customers or wanting to strengthen the relationship with your current ones, it’s important to maintain updated social media accounts.
Reach a Large Audience
In the first quarter of 2020, Facebook reported more than 1.7 billion active daily users and more than 2.6 billion actively engaged monthly users. No matter who your customer is, it is likely they are on Facebook. In the US, nearly 70% of adults are on Facebook with numbers of older Americans joining in increasing numbers. While Facebook is the current undisputed winner in the race to attract older users, younger folks are trending away from Facebook. To reach this cohort, use newer social channels like Snapchat, TikTok, or even the Facebook-own Instagram.
When it comes to social media for business, it’s a good idea to claim your business name on a variety of different channels, even if the channel isn’t an obvious fit. This helps to ensure that a company or brand name is taken by someone with malicious intentions and also increases the number of positive links to your website, improving your SEO.
Once the profile is set up, you can decide how much or little effort is needed. There are a variety of tools that allow businesses to set up and schedule social media posts from a single dashboard, making it simple to manage multiple social accounts at once. Consider who your typical (or ideal) customer is and let that guide the choice in choosing social channels.
Stay Top-of-Mind with Customers
In addition to the ability to have a direct line to new customers, social offers a great way for brands and businesses to stay connected to past clients. Social media can be used to announce sales or specials, share helpful tips or industry tricks, or showcase the human side of your brand. It also offers a way for small business owners to update customers about changing availability or business operations right from a cell phone, a great help in our fast-moving world.
If you’ve found a channel that works well for your audience, make the effort to learn about all the available features of that channel. Many channels have additional features like live video streaming, private or public groups, or even e-commerce features built directly into their apps. This offers additional ways to engage with and potentially convert your audience. Likewise, you should re-purpose your social media content by adding it to your website.
Boost Your Website Traffic
Social media offers multiple ways to boost your website traffic and creates more opportunities to convert visitors to customers. Social media profiles should contain a link back to the main business website. Posts and updates can direct followers back to the site in one click.
Active social media profiles can also help to improve the organic ranking of your website on search engines like Google. From winning new clients, selling directly, or providing important information to existing customers, having a website has been standard practice for years. It used to be that business owners could only rely on SEO tactics to rank well and win organic search traffic, but social media has provided another way to boost website traffic through link building.
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